THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 


The  Woman  of 
To-morrow 


By 

Helen  M.  Winslow 

\\ 

Author  of  "Literary  Boston  of  To-day" 

"Concerning  Cats,"  etc. 


New  York 

James  Pott  &  Company 
1905 


Copyright,   1905,  by  JAMES  POTT  &  Co. 
First  Impression,  September,   1905 


To 

My  Sisters 


3.34258 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 7 

II.     ON  INDIVIDUAL  RESPONSIBILITY 15 

III.  ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 29 

IV.  ON  FRIENDS 38 

V.    ON  ENEMIES 49 

VI.    ON  MRS.  GUMMIDGE 58 

VII.    ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 69 

VIII.    ON  THE  ESSENTIALS  OF  HAPPINESS 79 

IX.    ON  WORRY 93 

X.    ON  SOLITUDE 102 

XI.    ON  WOMEN'S  CLUBS 115 

XII.     ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 139 

XIII.  ON  THE  AVERAGE  WOMAN H9 

XIV.  ON  PUBLIC  DUTIES 160 

XV.     ON  HOME-LOVING  AND  HOUSEKEEPING 169 

XVI.    ON  GROWING  OLD 179 

XVII.    ON  THE  OUTLOOK 193 

[5] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 


THE   WOMAN   OF   TO-MORROW 

WHAT  will  she  be  like,  the  woman  of 
to-morrow  ?  We  know  all  about  the 
woman  of  to-day — her  virtues,  ten- 
dencies, shortcomings,  her  hopes,  aims  and  splen- 
did promise ;  reams  have  been  written  about  the 
woman  of  the  past,  in  all  ages,  under  all  condi- 
tions, her  limitations,  her  achievements.  But 
what  about  the  woman  of  to-morrow  ?  Will  she 
go  on  steadily,  firmly,  unswervingly  towards  the 
full  accomplishment  of  what  we  women  to-day 
long  for,  hope  for,  pray  for,  wait  for?  Will 
she? 

When  we  look  back  fifty  years  and  note  what 
has  been  overcome,  what  women  have  achieved 
in  educational,  business,  philanthropic  and  socio- 
logical lines,  we  are  wont  to  preen  ourselves  and 

[7] 


THE 'WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

to  glory  in  all  "we"  have  accomplished.  Fifty 
years  ago  the  first  woman  was  just  beginning  to 
wrest  her  diploma  from  the  unwilling  university. 
Fifty  years  ago  the  first  woman  doctor  was  tak- 
ing her  degree.  The  first  newspaper  women 
were  making  their  first  attempts  at  journalism. 
And  scores,  yes,  hundreds,  of  avenues,  now  so 
long  open  to  women  that  we  do  not  stop  to  count 
them,  were  not  only  shut,  but  nobody  was  dream- 
ing of  pushing  them  ajar — nobody,  that  is,  but 
Susan  B.  Anthony  and  Elizabeth  Cady  Stanton 
and  Lucy  Stone  and  their  friends — and  well 
ridiculed  for  it  they  were,  too. 

But  to-day  all  American  womanhood  stands 
on  a  broad,  high  plateau,  with  eager  faces  turned 
hopefully  to  the  future.  We  look  forward  confi- 
dently and  with  the  surety  of  success,  because 
everything  has  been  made  easy  for  us.  Are  we 
too  confident?  Is  there  not  danger  of  our  for- 
getting that  we  are  still  a  long  footpath  from 
the  millennium  and  that  there  is  a  deal  of  work 
to  be  done  before  women,  collectively  speaking, 
get  there  ?  Do  we  realize  sufficiently  the  duty  and 
responsibility  devolving  upon  us  in  regard  to  the 
betterment  of  home  and  humanity?  Do  we 
really  understand  the  opportunities  which  influ- 

[8] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

ence  begets  ?  And  since  woman's  responsibility 
goes  hand  in  hand  with  her  influence,  which  has 
always  been  proportionate  to  her  own  merit, 
while  environment  and  education  have  been  im- 
portant factors  in  determining  this  work,  then 
how  great  must  be  her  responsibility  to-day  as 
compared  with  that  of  her  sister  in  former  ages ! 
Mary  Lyon  used  for  the  motto  at  Mount  Hoi- 
yoke  in  the  days  when  our  mothers  and  grand- 
mothers used  to  come  under  her  care,  "Freely 
have  ye  received,  freely  give" — although,  for 
that,  the  words  originated  with  a  Greater 
than  Mary  Lyon.  There  is  no  doubt  about 
our  having  "freely  received";  are  we  "freely 
giving"  ?  There  was  never  a  period  in  the 
world's  history  when  women's  work  counted  for 
so  much,  when  it  was  so  much  needed.  Ancient 
history  says  very  little  about  what  women  did 
in  the  early  ages ;  but  we  know  they  did  their  part. 
The  model  women  of  Hebrew  history  were  toil- 
ers. We  see,  as  one  bright  woman  has  said,  "a 
mother's  ready  ingenuity  saving  the  life  of  her 
baby  boy,  when  the  father's  strength  was  a 
broken  reed.  We  see  her  commit  the  tiny  ark 
to  the  mercy  of  the  waters  of  the  Nile;  we  see 
another  woman — a  sister — running  fleet-footed 

[9] 


THE    WOMAN    OF   TO-MORROW 

along  the  reedy  banks  of  the  river,  her  loving 
eyes  upon  the  rocking  cradle  adrift  on  the  eddy- 
ing stream.  We  see  yet  another  woman — a 
king's  daughter — stoop  to  the  river's  edge  to 
lift  in  her  arms  the  child  of  destiny.  Three 
women  working  in  unconscious  federation — and 
lo !  a  race  of  men  is  freed  and  a  kingdom  builded 
in  the  wilderness!" 

What  the  world  wants  of  woman  to-day  is 
the  utmost  development  of  the  positive  feminine 
moral  force  in  her  spirit  and  her  life.  Woman 
has  been  said  to  be  the  conscience  of  the  world, 
and  there  is  profound  truth  in  that.  It  was  the 
conscience  of  Blanche  of  Castile  which  melted 
the  noblest  king  France  ever  had — Louis  the 
Ninth.  It  was  the  conscience  of  the  American 
woman  which  was  the  one  invulnerable,  irresist- 
ible, unsilenced  enemy  of  American  slavery. 
That  conscience  of  woman  is  the  tower  which 
society  will  always  need  to  have  developed  and 
regnant  within  it,  and  there  is  no  other  office  so 
great. 

Sympathy  in  woman  comes  nearest  to  the 
heart  of  Christ — sympathy  for  the  erring,  the 
sick  and  suffering.  That  is  one  power  which 
she  needs  to  contribute  to  society.  Her  sym- 

[10] 


THE    WOMAN    OF    TO-MORROW 

pathy  is  the  heat  ray  combined  with  the  light 
ray  in  the  perfect  sunbeam,  and  wherever  it  goes 
there  flower  charities,  asylums,  and  all  institu- 
tions of  human  benevolence  spring  naturally  as 
the  bloom  of  the  flowers  from  the  sod  which 
the  sun  has  warmed. 

Then,  too,  there  is  woman's  courage.  We  are 
so  accustomed  to  associate  courage  with  physical 
strength  that  we  do  not  always  think  of  it  as 
pre-eminently  a  womanly  grace  when  the  femi- 
nine nature  has  been  fully  unfolded  and  trained, 
but  it  is.  The  reckless  rapture  of  self-forgetful- 
ness,  that  which  inspires  persons  and  nations, 
that  which  is  sovereign  over  obstacle  and  de- 
feat, and  perils  and  resistance,  has  belonged  to 
woman's  heart  from  the  beginning.  In  the  early 
pagan  time,  in  the  Christian  development,  in 
mission  and  in  martyrdoms,  it  has  shown ;  in  the 
mediaeval  age  as  well  as  in  our  own  time ;  in  the 
Prussian  woman  after  the  battle  of  Jena,  when 
Prussia  seemed  trampled  into  the  bloody  mire 
under  the  cannon  of  Napoleon.  Oh,  the  pas- 
sion, the  forgetfulness,  the  supreme  self-devo- 
tion with  which  woman  flings  herself  into  the 
championship  of  a  cause  that  is  dear  and  sacred 
and  trampled  under  foot!  It  is  her  crown  of 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

renown ;  it  is  her  staff  of  power !  This  conscien- 
tiousness in  woman,  this  sympathy,  this  courage 
and  self-devotion  in  woman,  give  her  her  place 
in  the  future  civilization  of  the  world  and  glorify 
the  society  into  which  she  is  born  and  of  which 
she  becomes  the  mistress. 

W"e  are  in  need  of  city  mothers  as  well  as  city 
fathers;  not  until  the  mother-care  has  reached 
out  into  all  departments  of  municipal  life  and 
the  incentive  to  good  has  become  as  powerful  as 
the  incentive  to  evil ;  not  until  the  beautiful  and 
the  true  are  clothed  in  forms  as  attractive  as  the 
vile  and  false ;  not  until  nobleness  and  purity  of 
character  are  requisites  demanded  of  those  who 
fill  high  public  positions — not  until  then  will 
women  cease  to  have  opportunity  for  efficient, 
practical  effort;  not  until  then  will  women  cease 
to  have  a  share  of  public  responsibility. 

According  to  Dean  Swift,  the  men  of  his  age 
asked  each  other  if  it  were  prudent  to  choose  a 
wife  who  had  a  little  knowledge  of  history  and 
the  capacity  to  discuss  the  more  important  af- 
fairs of  the  time  and  the  obvious  beauties  of 
poetry.  The  general  verdict,  he  says,  was 
against  such  attainments  in  women  because  their 
tendency  was  to  make  wives  pretentious  and  con- 

[12] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

ceited,  and  not  duly  subject  to  their  husbands. 
I  know  of  but  one  man  to-day  who  would  dare 
express  such  sentiments,  if  he  believed  them — 
and  but  few  who  can  be  suspected  of  cherishing 
such  ideas  in  secret.  For  we  have  not  many  men 
who  belong  in  the  past  ages. 

Even  in  the  early  years  of  the  last  century 
it  was  supposed  that  woman's  mentality  could  be 
broadened  and  exercised  sufficiently  by  the  re^ 
ceipt  book  and  the  sampler,  and  it  was  not  till 
the  inventions  of  each  succeeding  decade  light- 
ened woman's  labor  that  she  had  greater  time 
for  study.  It  was  this  development  which 
brought  about  the  beginnings  of  the  club  move- 
ment, in  the  late  sixties  and  early  seventies, 
which  gathered  in  women  who  desired  mental 
improvement  and  longed  for  that  life  which  was 
more  than  meat  and  drink — women  who  needed 
an  outlook  upon  the  world  at  large  and  an  inlook 
upon  their  own  intellectual  condition.  But  mere 
literary  work  did  not  satisfy  women  who  con- 
scientiously believed  that  influence  meant  respon- 
sibility and  were  clear-sighted  enough  to  see  that 
in  organization  was  the  power  to  combat  the  ills 
of  the  world  and  to  elevate  humanity.  Thus 
they  broadened  their  scope,  making  their  object 

[13] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

humanity-lifting.  Above  all  is  it  to  be  seen  in 
the  mental  development  of  woman  herself  and  in 
her  awakening  to  the  fact  that  she  has  powers 
and  capabilities  which  can  be  used  for  the  good 
of  humanity. 

This  rule,  given  in  "What  All  the  World's 
a-Seeking,"  ought  to  be  daily  read  over  by  all 
women :  The  self  should  never  be  lost  sight  of. 
It  is  the  one  thing  of  supreme  importance,  the 
greatest  factor  even  in  the  life  of  the  greatest 
service.  Being  always  and  necessarily  precedes 
doing;  having  always  and  necessarily  precedes 
giving.  But  this  law  also  holds:  That  when 
there  is  being,  it  is  all  the  more  increased  by  the 
giving.  Keeping  to  one's  self  dwarfs  and  stulti- 
fies. Hoarding  brings  loss;  using  brings  ever 
greater  gain.  In  brief,  the  more  we  are,  the 
more  we  can  do ;  the  more  we  have,  the  more  we 
can  give.  And  thus  it  is  that  one  becomes  a 
queen  among  women.  Not  honor  for  themselves, 
but  service  for  others.  But  notice  the  strange, 
wonderful,  beautiful  transformation  as  it  returns 
upon  itself — honor  for  themselves,  because  of 
service  for  others. 


II 

ON  INDIVIDUAL   RESPONSIBILITY 

BUT  we  must  not  let  our  sense  of  individual 
responsibility  for  the  general  welfare  be- 
come too  keen.  When  we  consider  the 
multiplication  of  societies  almost  daily  for  the 
amelioration  of  every  possible  wrong  and  the 
furtherance  of  nearly  every  possible  good,  we 
seem  in  some  danger  of  such  a  result.  Not  only 
the  average  woman,  but  the  exceptional  one,  is 
infected  by  the  universal  desire  to  improve  the 
world  in  general  and  mankind  in  particular;  and, 
figuratively,  she  seems  to  be  going  forth  morn- 
ing, noon  and  night  seeking  for  new  evils  to 
conquer.  Mrs.  Jellaby  and  her  Society  for  the 
Amelioration  of  the  Condition  of  the  Orphans 
of  Borrioboolah  Gah  was  but  a  caricatured  pro- 
totype of  the  passion  for  organized  work  among 
women  at  the  close  of  the  century  in  which  Dick- 
ens lived  and  wrote.  We  are  all  in  danger  of 

[15] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

overlooking  the  best  and  sweetest  in  life,  as  well 
as  its  real  meaning  and  essence,  in  our  mad  rush 
after  what?  Is  it  the  passion  for  humanity?  or 
is  it  a  sort  of  contagious  fever,  the  germs  of 
which,  having  obtained  an  insidious  foothold  in 
our  mental  and  moral  systems,  work  an  uncon- 
scious change  in  us  from  earnest,  sincere  and 
reasonably  contented  women  to  restless,  ambi- 
tious and  discontented  ones  ? 

True,  Saint  Paul  did  say  that  woman  was  cre- 
ated for  the  man,  and  there  will  always  be  men 
— and  women,  too — who,  though  they  deny  the 
inspiration  of  every  other  part  of  the  Scriptures, 
stake  their  faith  on  the  infallibility  of  this  alleged 
prophecy  of  woman's  perpetual  subjection.  But 
the  copyright  on  his  oracular  utterances  expired 
centuries  ago.  Some  of  the  new  beliefs  are  not 
so  good  as  some  of  the  old  ones,  and  these  will 
pass  away.  Some  are  better,  and  these  will  re- 
main. But  the  whole  truth  is  that  it  is  fair 
neither  to  Saint  Paul  nor  to  woman  to  quote  him 
in  fragments.  He  adds,  a  very  little  way  fur- 
ther on,  "for  as  the  woman  is  of  the  man,  so  is 
the  man  also  by  the  woman."  And  this  almost 
inextricably  mixes  up  the  relations  of  man  and 
woman ;  but  there  does  not  seem  to  be  any  escap- 
[16] 


ON   INDIVIDUAL   RESPONSIBILITY 

ing  the  conclusion  that  woman's  responsibilities 
began  about  at  the  beginning. 

Saint  Paul's  opinion  as  to  the  attitude  and  be- 
havior of  women  in  public  assemblies  is  hardly 
apropos  now,  and  if  he  were  alive  to-day  he 
would  be  the  first  to  admit  it.  Thucydides  ante- 
dated the  apostle  by  four  centuries,  and  his  re- 
marks to  the  effect  that  "Happiest  is  that  woman 
whose  name  is  least  in  the  mouths  of  men"  are, 
of  course,  equally  beneath  the  serious  consider- 
ation of  the  woman  of  to-day,  even  though  they 
are  echoed  by  so  recent  and  popular  a  writer  as 
the  author  of  "The  Bread  Winners."  "A 
woman's  name  should  never  be  in  the  newspapers 
more  than  twice:  when  she  marries  and  when 
she  dies."  Yet  it  was  but  a  little  while  ago  that 
I  heard  a  prominent  woman  say : 

"I  wish  you  and  I  were  living  in  a  little  coun- 
try town  somewhere  where  we  could  be  content 
to  knit  and  crochet  and  wash  dishes  and  feed  the 
cat.  I  know  we  would  all  be  much  happier  if 
we  were  freed  from  this  'divine  discontent'  which 
leads  us  to  fret  our  souls  for  that  which  is  naught 
when  we  get  it."  There  might,  however,  be 
some  trouble  in  finding  the  country  town  where 
the  modern  longing  to  be  a  factor  in  the  life  of 

[17] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

to-day  has  not  penetrated.  It  is  not  altogether 
confined  to  cities,  this  passion  for  the  general 
welfare.  It  is  shared  by  the  woman  of  limited 
opportunities  and  crops  out  in  the  least  suspected 
places. 

Without  it  where  would  be  the  progress  made 
by  our  sex  in  the  last  half  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury? What  would  be  the  position  of  woman, 
for  instance,  had  not  Lucy  Stone  been  born  with 
the  sense  of  individual  responsibility  which  made 
of  her  a  saint  and  an  apostle  for  the  uplifting 
of  the  modern  woman,  to  whom  all  femininity, 
whether  suffragist  or  remonstrant,  owes  its  rec- 
ognition and  its  place  to-day?  She  and  her  im- 
mediate followers  were,  perhaps,  the  first  to  de- 
velop this  divine  discontent  which  is  the  inspira- 
tion and  source  of  much  of  the  modern  sense  of 
individuality  for  the  general  welfare.  And  in 
view  of  all  the  good  work  that  is  being  inspired 
and  carried  out  by  women,  who  shall  be  so  blind 
as  to  deny  that  it  is  a  part  of  the  great  plan  of 
evolution  concerned  in  the  problems  that  beset 
the  opening  of  a  new  century? 

The  banding  together  of  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  women  for  various  purposes  directly 
dealing  with  the  world's  advancement  along  the 
[18] 


ON   INDIVIDUAL   RESPONSIBILITY 

lines  of  education,  temperance,  philanthropy,  po- 
litical affairs  and  good  government  emphasizes  a 
new  phase  of  this  old  world's  history.  And 
the  fact  that  the  very  existence  of  this  state  of 
affairs  is  owing  to  the  impossibility  of  the  mod- 
ern woman's  sitting  quietly  at  home  and  ignoring 
her  part  in  the  general  scheme  of  humanity  com- 
pels us  to  own  that  this  sense  of  responsibility 
is  not  to  be  regretted,  but  rather  to  be  taken  as 
an  awakening  of  the  real  woman  to  a  knowledge 
of  what  the  "eternal  feminine"  may  be  made  to 
mean  to  the  world  at  large. 

It  is  not,  therefore,  to  be  deplored,  but  to  be 
controlled.  There  is  little  danger  of  its  becom- 
ing abnormally  strong  in  the  aggregate;  but 
alas !  for  her  who  lets  her  own  sense  of  what  she 
as  an  individual  owes  to  society  at  large,  cease 
to  be  a  purpose  in  life  and  become  her  master. 
She  it  is  who  joins  every  club  within  reach  and 
rushes  madly  from  section  to  class  in  search  of 
diversion  and  from  club  to  club  in  what  she  flat- 
ters herself  is  the  pursuance  of  culture.  She  it 
is  who  forgets  that  an  hour  spent  in  the  silence 
of  her  own  room  or  by  her  own  fireside  with 
some  book  that  is  really  worth  while  is  more 
profitable  than  two  afternoons  listening  to  mo- 


THE    WOMAN    OF   TO-MORROW 

sales  carefully  inlaid  from  bits  of  the  encyclo- 
paedia. She  it  is  who  leaves  her  sick  and  lonely 
child  to  the  care  of  hired  nurses  while  she  goes 
gaily  from  club  pillar  to  D.  A.  R.  post  or  neg- 
lects the  great  home  truth  that  a  smiling,  restful 
wife  across  the  dinner  table  is  the  easiest  way 
to  convert  the  ordinary  man  to  belief  in  women's 
organizations. 

It  cannot  be  denied,  however,  that  the  modern 
tendency  to  organize  has  greatly  stimulated  this 
sense  of  responsibility  for  the  whole  human  race 
that  is  at  once  a  bane  and  an  inspiration  to  the 
up-to-date  woman.  Women  are  gregarious  and 
imitative.  Let  us  once  realize  that  our  friends 
are  active  factors  in  the  arena  of  life  and  we  are 
immediately  fired  with  a  determination  to  be- 
come factors,  too.  We  want  to  go  with  the  rest 
of  our  kind,  whether  it  be  in  the  manner  of  re- 
forms or  bonnets.  We  will  no  more  be  consid- 
ered behind  the  times  in  organization  than  in 
sleeves.  Therefore,  if  other  women  belong  to 
dozens  of  such  societies,  why  not  we  ? 

It  is  a  great  compliment  to  women  that  they 
are  being  so  cordially  recognized  by  organiza- 
tions of  men.  Their  educational  associations  are 
inviting  our  co-operation  in  the  consideration  of 
[20] 


ON   INDIVIDUAL   RESPONSIBILITY 

questions  of  how  best  to  work  out  the  problems 
with  which  they  are  confronted.  From  time  im- 
memorial men  have  not  asked  the  help  of  women 
in  vain.  Since  Eve's  day  we  have  been  making 
up  for  her  thoughtlessness  in  allowing  tempta- 
tion to  come  before  Adam  (she  not  having  lived 
long  enough  to  realize  that  men  are  to  be 
guarded  from,  not  exposed  to,  temptation),  and 
in  all  ages  whenever  women  could  be  of  use  to 
mankind  in  general  they  have  done  their  work 
nobly  and  well.  Our  Pilgrim  foremothers  are 
not  exploited  in  histories  as  they  would  have 
been  had  they  fought  Indians  and  defied  kings. 
But  nobody  pretends  to  deny  that  they  acted 
fully  as  important  a  part  as  did  their  worthy 
husbands  and  sires.  Our  grandmothers  of  the 
Revolutionary  War  were  no  small  factors  in  the 
establishment  of  a  new  republic.  The  religious 
history  of  the  world,  since  the  day  of  Mary,  the 
carpenter's  mother,  shows  that  the  sense  of  indi- 
vidual responsibility  is  no  new  development  of 
the  modern  woman.  It  has  been  behind  the 
greatest  achievements  of  the  ages. 

What  has  stimulated  it  and  spread  it  like  bits 
of  leaven  among  the  masses  is  a  question  for 
us  to  consider.  Is  it  because  of  the  facility  with 

[21] 


THE    WOMAN    OF   TO-MORROW 

which  newspapers  and  magazines  and  books  now 
reach  even  the  remotest  of  our  borders?  It  is 
hardly  possible  in  these  days  to  live  apart  from 
a  knowledge  of  what  is  going  on  in  the  great 
round  world.  There  is  scarcely  a  hamlet  in  the 
country  unreached  by  a  daily  newspaper,  and 
the  ordinary  workingman  to-day  knows  more 
of  the  general  trend  of  affairs  than  the  most 
learned  and  far-seeing  of  our  grandfathers  pos- 
sibly could  do.  What  is  the  effect  of  all  this 
modern  development  of  progress?  of  this  indi- 
vidual sense  of  responsibility?  The  common 
consciousness  of  humanity,  the  sense  of  our  in- 
dividual need  and  our  individual  duty  is  making 
itself  felt.  We  are  open  to  deeper  and  wider 
impulses ;  let  us  see  that  they  are  not  allowed  to 
die  away  as  mere  impulses.  One  of  the  inevitable 
effects  of  the  modern  stimulus  of  organization 
is  a  high  degree  of  personal  consciousness.  We 
feel  the  responsibility  of  the  whole  "woman's 
movement";  we  not  only  have  a  larger  and 
broader  personality  and  a  sense  of  revolt  against 
any  form  of  injustice,  but  we  feel  a  wider, 
deeper  love  for  each  other.  We  are  standing  to- 
gether in  a  concerted  movement  seeking  a  com- 
mon good;  and  that  brings  us  into  a  broader 

[22] 


ON  INDIVIDUAL  RESPONSIBILITY 

charity  and  a  commensurate  growth  of  social 
consciousness.  It  is  impossible  for  us  henceforth 
to  settle  back  into  selfish  living — that  is,  if  we 
are  developing  the  highest  privileges  that  come 
to  the  modern  woman.  We  shall  possess  our 
souls  in  patience  and  find  our  balance  in  a  seren- 
ity of  spirit  that  will  give  us  a  clearer  vision  and 
freedom  from  worry.  We  may  still  feel  that 
we  are  personally  responsible  for  a  great  deal 
in  the  world  around  us,  but  we  shall  not  worry 
and  fret  over  it,  and  we  shall  learn  the  secret  of 
combining  earnest,  constant  endeavor  with  a  sub- 
lime unconsciousness  to  the  pin-pricks  of  exist- 
ence. We  shall  see  and  feel  new  forces  and 
give  way  to  them  in  loyal  service. 

Doubtless  this  modern  sense  of  personal  re- 
sponsibility is  one  of  the  laws  of  social  evolution 
which  has  been  going  on  with  greater  activity 
than  most  people  have  realized  during  the  past 
quarter  century.  The  increasing  individualism 
of  women  is  one  of  the  striking  developments 
of  the  present  age.  For  that  very  reason  the 
radiating  diffusion,  as  one  writer  has  called  it, 
of  the  clubs  seems  all  the  more  welcome.  Until 
the  individual  woman  finds  her  special  differen- 
tiation, or,  in  other  words,  finds  her  balance,  she 

[23] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

is  in  danger  of  wasting  her  nervous  force  in 
vague  gropings  after  the  right  thing.  Never 
before  have  women  cared  so  much  for  other 
women,  and  the  result  is  greater  kindliness  and 
helpfulness  toward  human  nature  everywhere. 
The  heart  of  womanhood  is  alive  and  stirring 
as  never  before;  shall  we  dare  say  this  is  not 
kindling  a  streak  of  electric  fire  that  may  burn 
out  old  prejudices  and  kindle  a  new  era?  We 
may  still  be  in  the  groping,  vague  stage  where 
mistakes  are  as  frequent  as  the  right  steps,  but 
it  is  an  evident  uplift  in  the  scale  of  human  ad- 
vancement. 

Even  in  our  family  life  we  are  letting  the  old 
notions  go  and  recognizing  the  individuality  of 
each  member.  Children  are  now  allowed  to 
think  their  own  thoughts,  and  if  they  have  a 
special  bent  in  any  one  direction  it  is  encouraged 
rather  than  warped  to  fit  an  old,  set  pattern. 
Young  women  as  well  as  young  men  are  expected 
to  cultivate  outside  interests.  We  realize  that 
it  is  the  duty  of  every  woman  of  intelligence  to 
take  active  interest  in  some  social  organization 
and  recognize  some  duty  beyond  the  borders  of 
family  life.  Just  as  in  the  church  women  have 
labored  together  for  years  to  raise  funds  for 

04] 


ON  INDIVIDUAL  RESPONSIBILITY 

some  common  end — to  send  forth  missionaries 
to  the  heathen  or  pay  the  one  at  home — so  we 
have  come  to  know  the  value  of  organized  effort 
for  the  benefit  of  the  school,  the  home  and  the 
individual.  The  work  of  women  in  sanitary 
commissions  and  in  the  temperance  unions  has 
shown  what  may  come  of  the  modern  passion 
for  outside  work.  The  sense  of  humanity  is 
growing  daily,  and  though  this  may  crumble  and 
flatten  some  old  ideals,  it  also  puts  a  new  mean- 
ing and  a  new  heroism  into  life. 

It  depends  upon  us  what  we  will  make  the 
effect  on  our  own  lives  of  this  keen  anxiety  to 
do  something  for  the  world  around  us.  There 
will  always  be  work  enough.  There  will  always 
be  some  Macedonia  with  worthy  objects  crying 
earnestly,  "Come  over  and  help  us."  It  depends 
upon  us  whether  we  will  take  up  our  work  calmly 
and  strongly,  careful  not  to  undertake  more  than 
we  can  do  and  yet  not  to  leave  untouched  that 
for  which  we  are  best  fitted,  or  whether  we  will 
let  ourselves  become  so  "cumbered  with  much 
serving"  that  we  shall  lose  the  best  of  life's  har- 
monies, the  inner  life  of  the  soul.  We  are  in 
danger,  in  our  eagerness  to  be  of  service  and 
our  dread  of  losing  some  of  the  frills  of  life, 

[25] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  forgetting  that  we  can  do  no  better  service 
to  humanity  than  to  develop  our  own  selves  into 
the  highest  types  of  womanhood.  The  world 
will  always  stand  in  need  of  noble  women. 

The  great  trouble  with  the  average  woman 
is  that  she  does  not  readily  find  her  balance. 
Who  does  not  recall  some  rare,  sweet  nature 
that  while  bearing  the  burdens  of  life — heavy 
burdens,  perhaps — is  marked  by  a  serenity  of 
soul  that  is  as  restful  to  her  friends  as  it  is  help- 
ful to  herself?  But  alas!  who  cannot  count  on 
the  fingers  of  one  hand  the  number  of  such 
women?  On  the  other  hand,  the  women  who 
flutter  and  hover  and  tremble  and  bustle  and 
chatter  are  far  from  isolated  cases.  One  is  al- 
most tempted  to  liken  them  to  the  sands  of  the 
seashore. 

It  is  not  that  they  are  not  eager  to  be  of  the 
highest  service  to  mankind,  but  simply  that  they 
do  not  get  at  the  true  secret  of  how.  How  to 
be  lifted  above  the  personal  frets,  the  personal 
sense  of  importance.  Perhaps  it  is  the  personal 
element  that  spoils  it ;  eliminate  that  and  the  true 
cause  for  fretting  and  r/orrying  has  in  a  large 
measure  disappeared.  Sometimes  the  question 
of  what  needs  to  be  done  gets  entirely  shunted 

[26] 


ON  INDIVIDUAL  RESPONSIBILITY 

off  the  track  by  that  other  one :  What  will  be  the 
easiest  way  for  me  to  do  it  ? 

The  sense  of  individual  responsibility  for  the 
general  welfare  is  one  of  the  hopeful  signs  of 
the  times.  We  may  as  well  recognize  it  and 
that  each  generation  needs  more  and  more  some 
sort  of  association  with  each  other.  We  are  in- 
dividuals, but  the  force  which  draws  us  together 
and  keeps  us  eager  to  work  for  a  common  cause 
is  a  need  that  belongs  to  the  later  development 
of  the  human  race.  We  need  each  other  and  to 
come  together  and  work  together  just  as  much 
as  we  need  a  home  where  we  can  sometimes  be 
alone.  And  this  social  dependence  on  one  an- 
other is,  as  one  writer  says,  the  highest  faculty 
of  the  highest  race  on  earth. 

That  is  one  of  the  chief  reasons  why  we  come 
together  to  discuss  methods  of  thought  and  of 
work.  The  women  who  join  clubs  because  it  is 
the  fashion  or  because  of  restlessness  and  empti- 
ness of  mind  are  few;  the  women  who  join  be- 
cause of  their  need  of  belonging  to  a  throng  that 
can  stir  and  throb  and  work  in  unison  are  legion. 
We  are  seeking  more  or  less  consciously  the 
higher  forms  of  relation  which  are  the  strength 
of  modern  life.  And  this  is  the  result  of  a  pro- 

[27] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

longed  thirst  among  women  for  a  fuller  and 
truer  social  life  than  that  provided  by  the  ordi- 
nary functions  of  society. 

It  scarcely  seems  necessary  to  sum  up  by  say- 
ing that  this  sense  of  personal  responsibility  for 
the  general  welfare  is  back  of  all  organized 
work,  nor  to  repeat  that  it  is  to  us,  like  life,  what 
we  make  of  it.  It  is  for  us  each  and  severally  to 
settle  that  question.  If  we  take  the  attitude  of 
master  and  make  of  this  feeling  a  servant  to  do 
our  bidding,  well  and  good;  if,  on  the  other  hand, 
we  let  it  master  us  and  become  a  slave  to  a  vague 
and  general  desire  to  do  something  for  some- 
body without  the  slightest  idea  of  how  or  what, 
then  woe  be  to  us ! 


[28] 


Ill 

ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 

HOW  are  we  seeking  to  get  the  most  out 
of  life?  By  selfishly  striving  to  grasp 
all  the  good  things  therein  for  our- 
selves? By  trying  to  stamp  our  own  individ- 
uality upon  everything,  by  making  ourselves  a 
personal  power  ?  Or  are  we  realizing  that  only 
in  serving  others  can  we  best  help  ourselves? 
"He  that  is  greatest  among  you  shall  be  your 
servant."  And  what  is  a  servant?  One  who 
works  for  others.  Look  over  the  women  of  your 
acquaintance.  Is  it  the  self-seeking  woman,  who 
sacrifices  her  dignity  in  a  scramble  for  promi- 
nence and  who  pushes  herself,  regardless  of  the 
rights  of  others,  into  prominent  positions,  whose 
name  stands  for  real  service  and  real  value  in 
the  world  ?  Or  is  it  she  who  forgets  herself  and 
the  paltry  honors  that  come  with  self-sought 
place  in  honest,  unselfish  work  and  far-seeing, 

[29] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

wise  and  charitable  thought  for  the  best  good 
of  the  whole  whose  name  is  written  high  on 
uRolls  of  Honor"  ? 

She  who  is  great  enough  to  lose  sight  of  small, 
unworthy  aims  and  makes  it  her  chief  purpose  to 
help  and  serve  others  will  always  be  the  one  who 
is  instinctively  trusted.  True  greatness  and  true 
happiness  do  not  come  when  we  set  ourselves 
deliberately  to  call  them  to  serve  our  purpose. 
It  is  only  by  putting  our  lives  in  harmony  with 
the  great  principle  of  service  to  our  fellow-men 
that  we  shall  find  them.  It  is  of  little  use  to 
strive  to  attain  popularity,  greatness,  power  over 
others ;  it  is  of  infinite  use  to  find  out  how  we  can 
be  of  service  to  those  with  whom  we  are  asso- 
ciated, and  then  to  forget  ourselves  in  such  serv- 
ice. Kindliness,  helpfulness,  service:  these  three 
were  never  more  needed  than  now.  The  great- 
hearted, sympathetic,  charitable-minded,  brave 
woman  is  needed  everywhere.  She  it  is  who  is 
beloved,  who  makes  for  peace  and  righteousness ; 
yes,  and  for  power.  And  it  is  easy  to  see  why 
she  is  the  woman  of  power. 

Let  us  learn  the  secret  of  * 'putting  ourselves 
on  the  side  of  the  universal."  Let  us  work  from 
the  heart,  giving  ourselves  with  no  thought  of 

[30] 


ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 

personal  gain.  The  more  we  do  this  the  broader 
will  become  our  vision,  the  grander  our  lives; 
and  thus  while  we  are  giving  ourselves  to  others 
the  fuller  and  richer  and  truer  will  life  be  for 
us ;  and  we  shall  cease  to  think  whether  we  are 
getting  our  money's  worth,  satisfied  with  the  joy 
of  living  and  the  unconscious  growth  within. 
Can  there  be  anything  more  beautiful  in  life 
than  to  become  one  of  those  rare  souls  whose 
personality  is  a  help  to  their  fellow-creatures; 
whose  very  presence  is  like  a  benediction,  and 
from  whom  goes  out  a  silent  influence  that  can- 
not be  defined,  yet  which  every  one  within  its 
radius  feels,  even  though  not  a  word  be  spoken? 
And  is  there  not  a  way  by  which  this  serenity 
of  soul,  this  illumination,  may  become  a  charac- 
teristic of  every  good  woman? 

The  more  we  are  in  ourselves  the  more  we 
can  do,  the  more  we  shall  desire  to  do  for  others. 
There  is  nothing  greater  in  life,  nothing  greater 
in  Christianity  than  this  great  principle  of  help- 
fulness and  service  and  love  for  others.  It  is 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  to  which  we  all  aspire 
some  time  or  other,  only  we  do  not  always  real- 
ize that  it  is  here  and  now  if  we  will  have  it  so. 
And  in  proportion  as  we  stand  for  higher  con- 

[31] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

ditions  and  better  influences  we  are  an  uplifting 
power  to  those  around  us.  We  cannot  do  this, 
however,  if  we  allow  ourselves  to  take  narrow 
and  petty  views  of  the  lives  and  motives  of 
others.  Only  by  merging  the  personal  side  of 
things  into  the  larger,  universal  one;  by  rising 
above  prejudices  and  becoming  indifferent  to  the 
criticisms  and  opinions  of  others — so  long  as 
we  are  sure  of  being  actuated  by  right  motives 
ourselves — do  we  reach  the  higher  life.  Serv- 
ice to  others  is  the  great  solution  to  the  actual 
problem  of  life.  Realizing  and  building  our 
lives  upon  this  great,  eternal  principle,  minor 
things  will  not  matter. 

Think  how  much  more  charitable  we  then 
shall  be  toward  the  faults  and  failings  of  others. 
We  may  even  so  accustom  ourselves  to  the  larger 
view  of  life  and  service  that  we  shall  not  readily 
see  shortcomings  in  those  around  us ;  or,  if  called 
to  our  notice,  they  will  not  rasp  or  fret  us,  be- 
cause our  souls  are  lifted  above  the  plane  where 
such  trials  are  possible.  And,  above  all,  we  shall 
be  possessed  of  that  larger  charity  that  sees  be- 
neath the  surface  and  knows  that  we  have  no 
right  to  judge  our  sister.  Have  we  innate 
knowledge  and  infallible  wisdom  ourselves  that 

[32] 


ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 

we  shall  decide  for  another?  Can  we  know  of 
the  struggles  another  woman  makes  for  a  better 
life,  or  condemn  her  when  she  fails?  "You  may 
think  I  am  cynical  in  my  speech  and  impatient 
in  my  words  at  times,"  exclaimed  one  woman 
to  another  who  had  rebuked  her,  "but  you  do 
not  know  how  many  times  I  have  overcome  that 
tendency,  nor  that  I  am  striving  daily  to  out- 
grow it." 

The  limitations  of  other  women  are  no  per- 
sonal concern  of  ours.  It  is  ours  to  do  for 
others,  to  lose  our  own  pettiness  and  enlarge  our 
own  horizon  by  giving  loyal,  loving  service,  and 
this  includes  a  broad,  universal  love  to  all 
women,  to  the  world  around  us — a  world,  who- 
ever and  whatever  we  are,  that  always  needs 
us.  It  may  be  the  world  of  home,  it  may  be  the 
public  schoolroom,  it  may  be  the  ranks  of  fash- 
ionable society,  or  it  may  be  the  small  circle  of 
the  small  country  town,  but  our  love  and  our 
service  are  needed.  We  are  individually  respon- 
sible for  so  much. 

"From  each  as  she  has  power  to  give,  to  each 
as  she  has  need."  What  a  motto!  It  is  so  easy 
to  forget  that  each  one  has  something  to  give 
to  some  one.  And  what  is  this  giving  to  "each 

[33] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

as  she  has  need"?  It  is  being  gracious,  broad- 
minded,  tolerant  of  others,  unot  easily  puffed- 
up" — nor  put  out,  either;  it  is  by  keeping  our- 
selves in  a  serene,  well-balanced  frame  of  mind 
that  will  act  on  others  as  a  bit  of  bright  sunshine 
falling  across  a  dark  corner.  We  cannot  give 
to  others  anything  better  than  is  in  our  own  na- 
tures, and  only  by  keeping  them  bright  and  sunny 
can  we  shed  sweet  temper  and  serenity  of  soul 
wherever  we  go.  "How  shall  we  keep  ourselves 
so  if  we  are  not  born  that  way?"  asks  somebody. 
Cultivate  the  habit.  We  have  habits  of  mind  as 
well  as  of  body.  Cultivate  sunshine  and  sweet- 
ness in  ourselves  at  home,  every  day  and  every 
hour  in  the  day,  and  we  shall  have  no  difficulty 
in  keeping  sweet  and  pleasant  everywhere  else. 
Let  us  each  be  the  woman  for  whose  presence 
her  friends  wait  as  for  a  benediction  of  peace. 

Do  you  not  know  women  whose  very  presence 
is  uplifting,  whose  very  atmosphere  is  peace? 
We  might  all  be  so  if  we  would  set  ourselves 
steadily  and  calmly  to  work  to  find  our  balance 
and  lift  ourselves  to  a  mental  plane  where  out- 
side worries  and  flurries  and  tempers  and  jeal- 
ousies could  not  reach  us.  It  would  be  a  work 
of  time,  perhaps,  but  it  would  pay.  And  having 

[34] 


ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 

once  arrived  at  that  condition  we  should  help 
others  just  as  naturally  as  the  sun  sheds  its  life- 
giving  beams  on  the  dependent  earth.  Let  us 
learn  the  highest  secret  of  life,  self-giving.  Not 
for  what  it  will  bring  us  in  peace  or  honor  or 
happiness,  but  because  we  realize  how  much  the 
world  needs  disinterested  help,  and  how  much 
more  we  need  to  give  it.  "If  you  would  have 
all  the  world  love  you,  you  must  first  love  all  the 
world." 

"We  buy  ashes  for  bread; 
We  buy  diluted  wine; 
Give  me  the  tree — 

Whose  ample  leaves  and  tendrils  curled 
Among  the  silver  hills  of  heaven, 
Draw  everlasting  dew." 

A  few  years  ago  Mr.  Trine  took  occasion  to 
send  out  to  his  friends  a  little  card  with  the  fol- 
lowing printed  thereon.  It  helped  us  all,  and 
therefore  I  pass  it  on  like  so  much  "sunshine"  : 


"A  SORT  OF  CREED. 


"To  live  up  to  our  highest  in  all  things  that 
pertain  to  us. 

[35] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

"To  lend  a  hand  as  best  we  can  to  all  others 
for  this  same  end. 

"To  remain  in  nature  always  sweet  and  sim- 
ple and  humble,  and  therefore  strong. 

"To  open  ourselves  fully  and  to  keep  our- 
selves pure  and  clean  as  fit  channels  for  the 
Divine  Power  to  work  through  us. 

"To  turn  toward  and  keep  our  faces  always 
to  the  light. 

"To  do  our  own  thinking,  listening  quietly  to 
the  opinions  of  others,  and  to  be  sufficiently  men 
and  women  to  act  always  upon  our  own  convic- 
tions. 

"To  do  our  duty  as  we  see  it,  regardless  of 
the  opinions  of  others,  seeming  gain  or  loss,  tem- 
porary blame  or  praise. 

"To  play  the  part  of  neither  knave  nor  fool 
by  attempting  to  judge  another,  but  to  give 
that  same  time  to  living  more  worthily  our- 
selves. 

"To  get  up  immediately  when  we  stumble, 
face  again  to  the  light,  and  travel  on  without 
wasting  even  a  moment  in  regret. 

"To  love  all  things  and  to  stand  in  awe  or 
fear  of  nothing  save  our  own  wrongdoing. 

"To  recognize  the  good  lying  at  the  heart  of 

[36] ' 


ON  OUR  RELATION  TO  LIFE 

all  people,  of  all  things,  waiting  for  expression, 
all  in  its  own  good  way  and  time. 

"To  love  the  fields  and  the  wild  flowers,  the 
stars,  the  far-open  sea,  the  soft,  warm  earth,  and 
to  live  much  with  them  alone,  but  to  love  strug- 
gling and  weary  men  and  women  and  every  puls- 
ing living  creature  better. 

"To  strive  always  to  do  unto  others  as  we 
would  have  them  do  unto  us. 

"In  brief — to  be  honest,  to  be  fearless,  to  be 
just,  to  be  kind.  This  will  make  our  part 
in  life's  great  and  as  yet  not  fully  understood 
play  truly  glorious,  and  we  need  then  stand  in 
fear  of  nothing — life  nor  death ;  for  death  is  life. 

"Or,  rather,  it  is  the  quick  transition  to  life 
in  another  form;  the  putting  off  of  the  old  coat 
and  the  putting  on  of  a  new ;  a  passing  not  from 
light  to  darkness,  but  from  light  to  light,  accord- 
ing as  we  have  lived  here ;  a  taking  up  of  life  in 
another  form  just  where  we  leave  it  off  here;  a 
part  in  life  not  to  be  shunned  or  dreaded  or 
feared,  but  to  be  welcomed  with  a  glad  and 
ready  smile  when  it  comes  in  its  own  good  way 
and  time." 


[37] 


IV 

ON  FRIENDS 

WHO  shall  estimate  the  value  of  a 
cheery,  breezy,  hopeful  friend? 
Nobody  can  get  along  without  her. 
She  keeps  us  in  good  humor,  she  switches  off 
the  bores,  she  lights  us  up  and  keeps  things  in 
motion ;  in  her  company  our  spirits  rise,  our  wits 
grow  bright  and  our  tongues  loosen,  so  that  we 
really  believe  after  half  an  hour's  contact  with 
her  that  we  are  in  ourselves  as  brilliant  and  as 
happy  as  she  makes  us.  A  friend  that  can  raise 
everybody  around  her  from  a  state  of  practical 
imbecility  to  that  of  a  brilliant  and  beautiful 
song  bird  is  a  being  we  may  all  envy.  If  we 
would  be  such  a  friend  ourselves,  there  is  but 
one  way:  we  must  be  agreeable  at  all  times, 
kindly  serviceable  to  every  outward  call,  never 
see  a  slight  or  notice  a  snub,  and  never  allow 
ourselves  to  get  into  the  dumps.  "To  be  warped 

[38] 


ON   FRIENDS 

unconsciously  under  the  magnetic  influence  of  all 
around  is  the  destiny  to  a  certain  extent  of  even 
the  greatest  souls."  We  cannot  be  too  careful 
of  our  friendships,  nor  value  too  highly  the  love 
of  the  good  women  whom  we  meet  in  life. 

The  late  "Jennie  June,"  Mrs.  Croly,  said  at 
one  of  the  celebrations  in  honor  of  her  seven- 
tieth birthday:  "I  am  glad  to  have  lived  so 
many  years  because  I  have  come  to  know  that 
most  beautiful  thing  on  earth,  the  love  of  one 
woman  for  another — the  love  of  good  women 
for  one  another."  And  truly,  if  any  woman  on 
earth  has  reason  to  know  it,  this  "mother  of 
clubs,"  who  did  more  than  any  other  one  woman 
to  introduce  women  to  one  another,  ought  to 
from  long  and  intimate  experience.  Through 
her  pen,  that  of  the  first  regular,  trained  woman- 
journalist  in  the  world,  and  through  her  long, 
active  experience  as  president  of  the  foremost 
woman's  club  in  the  country,  Mrs.  Croly  did 
more,  perhaps,  for  the  emancipation  of  women 
in  a  social  way  than  almost  any  other  woman  of 
her  age,  and  we  may  well  pause  to  consider  her 
words  for  a  moment. 

It  has  long  been  the  custom,  even  among 
women,  to  sneer  at  the  love  of  woman  for 

[39] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

woman ;  to  say  that  women  cannot  be  true,  can- 
not overlook  peculiarities  in  other  women,  have 
not  charity  for  one  another's  shortcomings.  But 
the  women  who  say  this  to-day  are  not  trained 
thinkers  and  observers.  The  more  we  associate 
with  other  women  along  any  definite  line,  the 
broader  grows  the  individual  outlook,  the  more 
charitable  the  mental  attitude.  It  is  the  begin- 
ner who  believes  women  are  not  true  to  each 
other,  mainly  because  she  hasn't  it  in  her  own 
heart  to  be  true  to  others.  It  is  a  case  where 
the  verdict  of  the  immortal  bard  is  illustrated: 

uTo  thine  own  self  be  true; 
And  it  must  follow,  as  the  night  the  day, 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  false  to  any  man." 

The  modern  "passion  for  organization"  has 
done  more  for  the  friendships  of  women  than 
anything  else  has  ever  done.  It  has  lifted  the 
ordinary  woman  from  the  plane  of  petty  gossip 
and  trivial  interest  in  each  other's  every-day 
affairs,  and  it  has,  in  part  at  least,  killed  out  that 
love  of  gossip  which  in  times  past  men  have 
delighted  to  ascribe  to  women  as  their  especial 
prerogative;  although  for  that  matter  some  of 
[40] 


ON   FRIENDS 

the  worst  gossips  I  have  ever  known  are  men. 
Long  ago,  when  clubs  and  societies  were  first 
started,  the  club  may  have  been  a  promoter  of 
gossip  just  the  same  as  the  sewing  bee  and  the 
church  social  were  in  earlier  days.  Women  were 
not  trained  then  to  think  great  thoughts,  to  live 
on  a  plane  where  the  comings  and  goings  of  their 
neighbors  are  beneath  them,  to  take  so  broad  and 
lofty  an  outlook  upon  affairs  in  general  as  to  be 
incapable  of  scrutiny  of  the  insignificant  motives 
of  their  friends. 

After  working  together  for  others,  women 
begin  to  recognize  in  one  another  the  loftier 
ideals  and  higher  ambitions.  When  we  are  lifted 
upon  the  peak  of  high  living  ourselves,  we  are 
not  so  isolated  as  perhaps  we  once  thought  we 
should  be;  on  the  contrary,  we  are  able  to  see 
many  others  who  are  striving  to  reach  the  sum- 
mit of  high  thinking  and  worthy  endeavor. 
Women  have  needed  this  outlook  in  ages  past, 
while  they  are  but  just  coming  to  their  own,  and 
although  we  may  have  reached  the  state  where 
we  are  able  to  endure  our  own  company,  and  to 
find  comfort  in  the  inner  life,  we  need  the  friend- 
ship of  others;  we  need  the  sunshine  of  good 
company  to  bring  out  the  best  that  is  in  ourselves. 

[41] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

We  may  think  we  can  do  without  other 
people,  or  that  we  do  not  care  what  other  women 
think  of  us,  but  we  all  know  that  we  do  and  that 
we  depend  on  one  another  for  help  and  for  com- 
fort. If  we  are  inclined  to  too  much  introspec- 
tion or  to  looking  upon  the  dark  side  of  things 
it  is  well  to  take  pattern  after  Dr.  Johnson  and 
"live  in  a  crowd  of  jollity,"  at  least  so  far  as  to 
get  out  of  our  own  solitary  chambers  and  fling 
ourselves  into  something  which  is  their  polar 
opposite.  The  ordinary  woman  needs  contact 
with  her  intellectual  mates  in  order  that  she  may 
get  out  of  the  small  round  of  her  daily  sympa- 
thies and  interests.  Dr.  Johnson  was  the  great- 
est hypochondriac  in  the  world,  but  when  once 
aroused  by  stimulating  contact  with  the  wise  and 
the  erudite,  the  change  was  like  that  in  the  for- 
lorn, drooping  eagle  in  a  cage  to  the  same  bird 
when  free  to  soar  into  the  limitless  space  above. 

It  is  this  need  that  is  bringing  the  rich  woman 
into  closer  association  with  her  poorer  sister. 
This  mutual  contact  is  helpful.  The  one  learns 
that  riches  do  not  buy  brains  and  refinement ;  the 
other  finds  out  that  poverty  does  not  preclude 
the  possibility  of  richness  of  intellect  and  gentle 
manners.  If  one  wears  Paris  gowns  and  another 

[42] 


ON   FRIENDS 

is  severely  plain  in  her  costumes,  there  need  not 
be  any  difference  in  the  attire  of  their  ideas.  The 
one  sees  that  an  unfashionable  garment  may 
clothe  a  body  containing  a  mind  that  is  above 
rubies,  that  "the  rank  is  but  the  guinea's  stamp 
— the  man's  a  man  for  a'  that."  The  other  dis- 
covers that  her  next  neighbor,  whom  she  consid- 
ered a  toy  of  fashion,  has  a  soul  and  some  lofty 
aspirations.  Companionship  with  other  women 
renders  a  woman  more  lenient,  more  sincere  and 
more  sympathetic.  The  pettiness  of  personal 
aims  is  dying  out  in  the  presence  of  humanity's 
needs. 

We  should  not  forget  that  a  barbed  wire  fence 
shuts  out  more  than  it  shuts  in.  Social  barriers 
cannot  set  aside  mental  and  spiritual  harmonies, 
for  the  force  of  personality  is  becoming  the  su- 
preme force,  before  which  custom  and  conserva- 
tism must  yield.  The  standard  by  which  all  must 
judge  each  other  is  high,  unselfish  womanhood. 
The  result  of  woman's  individual  growth  is  no- 
where more  apparent  than  in  the  home,  the 
corner-stone  of  civilization,  and  in  her  friend- 
ships. 

Mrs.  Croly  declared  that  the  passion  for  asso- 
ciated effort  was  far  greater  than  any  one 

[43] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

woman,  and  that  no  woman  who  sought  only  her 
own  personal  aggrandizement  could  possibly 
have  more  than  a  transitory,  fleeting  fame.  How 
true  her  words  have  proved  can  easily  be  com- 
puted by  any  of  us.  We  all  know  women  who, 
through  personal  machination  or  what  is  even 
more  contemptible,  the  unscrupulous  use  of  their 
friends,  have  risen  to  high  positions;  but  who 
let  ambition  get  the  better  of  their  judgment, 
and  consequently,  though  clinging  tenaciously  to 
place  and  grasping  violently  at  position,  were 
finally  engulfed  in  the  sea  of  oblivion. 

But,  happily,  these  women  are  fewer  and 
fewer  as  the  years  rollby,  and  consequently  the 
limitations  of  self  are  giving  way  to  the  largeness 
of  a  universal  idea. 

To  enter  upon  any  labor  worthy  the  honest 
effort  of  any  earnest  woman  with  the  selfish  spirit 
dominant  within,  is  not  only  to  fail  ultimately  by 
the  personal  measure,  but  to  degrade  the  work 
itself  to  the  level  of  the  spirit  in  which  it  was 
undertaken ;  to  enter  upon  the  most  unpretending 
labor  simply  because  of  duty,  nobly  because  of 
the  possibility  for  others,  is  not  only  to  beautify 
the  worker,  but  to  glorify  the  work. 

A  soul  so  narrow  as  to  know  no  broader  hori- 

[44] 


ON   FRIENDS 

zon  than  is  measured  by  its  own  puny  pleasure  or 
purpose,  ideal  or  method,  can  never  be  long  in 
the  ascendant,  and  ultimately  receives  as  it  de- 
serves the  condemnation  of  the  larger,  better 
world;  the  life  that  has  no  definitely  fixed  ideal 
toward  which  it  is  stirring,  no  divinely  conceived 
mission  which  it  is  struggling  to  fulfil,  can  ex- 
pect no  less  than  the  hearty  contempt  of  an 
honest  humanity.  Shall  we  not  endeavor,  each 
of  us,  to  become  the  radiating  centre  of  kindli- 
ness and  good  will  and  helpfulness?  It  is  hard 
to  do  one's  best  and  then  to  be  troubled  with  a 
haunting  fear  or  a  real  consciousness  that  some 
one  else  would  have  done  that  particular  thing 
better.  It  is  harder  yet  to  do  one's  best,  to  work 
from  the  purest  motives  even,  and  then  to  feel 
that  one's  friends  are  looking  on  with  critical 
eye,  or,  at  best,  with  cold  approval.  Why  not 
say  the  appreciative  word  and  give  the  sympa- 
thetic hand  clasp  wherever  we  can  ? 

Harder  even  than  death  is  it  to  find  some 
dearly  loved  friend  grown  cold  and  indifferent; 
to  find  instead  of  the  loving  sympathy  that  has 
seemed  a  strong  fortress  in  the  past,  only  a  dis- 
tant formality,  a  chilling  frost;  or  to  find,  worse 
than  all,  disloyalty  in  place  of  truth.  Nothing 

[45] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

is  more  heart-breaking  than  to  find  a  love  grown 
cold,  especially  if  that  love  is  one  in  which  we 
have  trusted  and  believed  for  years.  Such  things 
happen.  We  find  in  place  of  the  sympathy  and 
affection  on  which  we  have  relied  without  ques- 
tion some  sudden  failure  in  time  of  stress.  The 
sympathy  we  have  accustomed  ourselves  to  lean 
upon  disappoints  us.  The  hollowness  of  insin- 
cerity rings  through  the  formal  attempt  to  simu- 
late affection  that  is  no  longer  a  vital  thing.  And 
when  this  experience  befalls  us — God  help  us. 

No;  death  is  not  the  worst  thing  that  can 
happen  to  us  or  to  our  friends.  I  sometimes 
wonder  if  it  is  not  the  best;  if  we  do  not  do 
wrong  in  wishing  back  those  who  have  gone  a 
little  before  us  to  the  silent  shore.  Death  is  a 
mystery,  but  it  may  be  the  best  part  of  life,  after 
all.  We  cannot  tell. 

We  say  we  believe  in  immortality;  that  we 
believe  the  future  life  will  take  us  far  in  advance 
of  this ;  that  we  are  to  be  infinitely  happier,  in- 
finitely better  and  infinitely  more  useful  there. 
Why,  then,  are  we  afraid  to  go  forward  into  it? 
Why  do  we  grudge  our  friends  that  experience? 
And  why — since  we  believe  in  infinite  love  and 
the  life  of  the  soul  hereafter  do  we  mourn  the 

[46] 


ON   FRIENDS 

death  of  any  human  love  when  we  are  sure  of 
God's  love  and  that  of  the  friends  who  have  gone 
before  ? 

There  is  a  poem  of  Edward  Rowland  Sill's 
that  has  long  been  a  favorite  with  me.  Perhaps 
it  may  bring  a  comforting  thought  to  some  other 
who  reads  it  here : 

What  if,  some  morning  when  the  stars  were 

paling 
And  the  dawn  whitened  and  the  east  was 

clear, 
Strange  peace  and  rest  fell  on  me   from  the 

presence 
Of  a  benignant  spirit  standing  near, 

And  I  should  tell  him,  as  he  stood  beside  me, 
"This  is  our  earth,  most  friendly  earth  and 
fair; 

Daily  its  sea  and  shore,  this  sun  and  shadow, 
Faithful  it  turns,  robed  in  its  azure  air? 

"There  is  best  living  here,  loving  and  serving, 

And  quest  of  truth  and  serene  friendship  dear; 
But  stay  not,  spirit.    Earth  has  one  destroyer, 
His  name  is  Death.     Flee,  lest  he  find  thee 
here." 

[47] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

And  what  if  then,  while  the  still  morning  bright- 
ened 
And    freshened    in    the    elm    the    summer's 

breath, 

Should  gravely  smile  on  me  the  gentle  angel, 
And  take  my  hand  and  say,  "My  name  is 
Death"? 


[48] 


ON  ENEMIES 

MARCUS  AURELIUS  says:  "No  man 
can  do  me  an  injury  unless  he  can 
make  me  misbehave  myself."  An 
older  authority  than  he  said:  "Love  your  en- 
emies." And  a  good  way  to  love  them  is 
not  to  recognize  them  as  enemies.  The  old 
Roman  was  right — as  usual.  The  greatest  harm 
any  one  can  do  us  is  to  disturb  the  harmony 
of  our  souls.  There  is  a  serenity  which  is  like 
an  armor.  It  protects  us  from  the  stings  of  petty 
jealousy  and  the  stabs  of  secret  foes.  Reports, 
false  or  true,  of  these  things  may  come  to  our 
ears,  but  we  shall  possess  our  souls  in  large  pa- 
tience and  refuse  to  be  ruffled  in  spirit  or  worried 
by  small  fears.  We  shall  not  "misbehave  our- 
selves." 

My  mother — the  best  and  wisest  woman  I 
ever  knew,  God  bless  her ! — used  to  tell  me  that 

[49] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

the  person  of  whom  it  could  be  said,  "He  or  she 
has  not  an  enemy  in  the  world,"  never  amounted 
to  anything.  Few  who  accomplish  any  real  good 
in  life  escape  the  attacks  of  the  envious.  No 
matter  how  disinterested  our  purpose  or  how 
high  our  ideal,  somebody  is  going  to  misunder- 
stand; somebody  is  going  to  impute  a  selfish 
motive.  Experience  with  the  world  will  teach 
us  to  expect  and  make  allowances  for  these 
things ;  but  we  need  not  be  soured  by  them,  nor 
lose  sight  of  our  own  standard,  provided  it  be  a 
right  one.  Only  by  lowering  our  own  ideals,  by 
giving  way  to  jealousy,  envy,  fear  or  discourage- 
ment can  we  really  be  touched  by  these  outside 
things.  Let  us  keep  single  to  the  purpose  of 
pressing  straight  forward  to  the  goal  of  right 
living  and  right  thinking,  not  expecting  every 
one  to  understand  or  even  appreciate  our 
motives,  and  our  enemies  can  do  us  no  real  harm. 
To  be  worried  and  fretted  by  little  things ;  to 
live  in  a  constant  atmosphere  of  anxiety  about 
what  may  or  may  not  be  said  of  us ;  to  be  con- 
tinually dwelling  upon  the  personal  impression 
we  are  making  on  others ;  to  be  forever  thinking 
of  ourselves  and  never  enlarging  our  vision  to 
the  greatness  of  humanity;  to  dwell  upon  the 

[50] 


ON  ENEMIES 

littleness  of  some  people  and  forget  the  nobleness 
of  others;  these  are  the  things  that  belittle  us 
and  keep  our  souls  from  growing.  It  matters 
not  who  or  what  are  our  enemies  from  without, 
so  long  as  we  keep  free  from  those  within.  And 
when  it  comes  to  that,  if  we  attend  diligently  to 
shutting  the  door  on  those  within  ourselves,  we 
shall  have  no  time  for  recognizing  our  foes  from 
without.  We  need  the  spirit  of  serenity  and 
sweetness  and  patience  with  our  fellow-crea- 
tures ;  and  to  practice  all  these  virtues.  We  need 
more  toleration  for  the  opinions  and  the  ex- 
pressions of  opinion  from  others.  We  need  to 
cultivate  broader  views;  to  remember  the  dif- 
ference in  environment  among  women;  to  re- 
mind ourselves  that  heredity  and  training  in  one 
part  of  the  country  may  differ  widely  from  the 
same  things  in  another  section;  and  to  educate 
ourselves  up  to  a  standard  where  we  can  see  that 
another  woman  is  not  necessarily  wrong  because 
she  cannot  see  things  in  just  the  same  light,  nor 
believe  just  the  same  way  that  we  do. 

One  of  the  greatest  things  any  movement  can 
do  for  women  is  to  develop  their  sense  of  pro- 
portion. As  the  individual  develops  and  broad- 
ens her  sympathies  by  doing  for  others,  the  small 

[51] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

personal  side  of  life  fades  into  the  background; 
the  weightier  interests  of  humanity  are  grasped 
by  degrees,  and  the  better  qualities  of  woman- 
hood come  out  in  bolder  relief.  In  this  evolution 
we  are  growing  up  to  a  point  where  petty  jeal- 
ousies will  never  be  recognized  and  small  en- 
mities will  have  no  place.  Self-development  and 
a  new  sort  of  self-possession  is  what  we  need. 

"Human  nature  is  so  constituted,"  some  one 
says,  "that  it  cannot  see  one  person  rising  above 
his  fellows  without  experiencing  the  pangs  of 
jealousy.  No  sooner  does  one  of  us  rise,  either 
by  force  of  our  own  abilities  or  by  a  combination 
of  outside  circumstances,  than  do  some  whom  we 
had  once  called  friends  set  to  work  to  pull  us 
down,  to  belittle  our  influence  and  to  malign  our 
motives.  Human  nature  cannot  stand  success  in 
other  people."  Some  human  nature  cannot,  per- 
haps. But  there  are  as  many  kinds  of  human 
nature  as  there  are  people  in  the  world.  We 
talk  as  if  human  nature  was  one  solid  lump  of 
which  everybody  is  fashioned,  and  consequently 
we  must  all  be  alike  at  heart — as  a  bushel  of 
peas.  Thank  God  there  are  more  kindly  na- 
tures in  the  world  than  unkindly,  and  a  hundred 
good  friends  who  rejoice  at  our  success  to  one 

[52] 


ON  ENEMIES 

who  gives  it  grudging  favor.  The  world  is  a 
much  better  place  than  we  give  it  credit  for 
being.  The  trouble  is  we  make  more  fuss  over 
the  one  enemy  than  we  do  over  five  hundred 
friends,  staunch  and  true.  There  is  lots  of  lov- 
able, kindly,  faithful,  generous  human  nature 
lying  around  loose.  It  is  easy  to  forgive  our 
enemies  by  forgetting  that  we  have  them.  It 
is  easy  to  make  good  cheer  for  others  by  keeping 
it  first  in  our  own  hearts.  The  selfish  inlooking 
soul  is  never  happy;  the  broad-visioned  worker 
for  humanity  may  always  be  so.  Which  shall 
we  choose  ? 

Let  us  look  out  and  not  in ;  let  us  forget  the 
annoyances  of  life  and  recognize  only  the  kind- 
ness and  nobleness  of  humanity ;  let  us  give  gen- 
erously of  ourselves,  seeking  nothing  in  return. 

We  worry  too  much  about  what  somebody  has 
said  or  may  say  against  us.  Some  petty  criticism 
which  should  be  beneath  our  notice  keeps  many 
a  woman  tossing  on  a  restless  pillow  half  the 
night. 

Said  a  white  sister  for  whom  old  Aunt  Han- 
nah was  washing: 

"Aunt  Hannah,  did  you  know  that  you  have 
been  accused  of  stealing?" 

[53] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

"Yes,  I  hearn  about  it,"  said  Aunt  Hannah, 
and  went  on  with  her  washing. 

"Well,  you  won't  rest  under  it,  will  you?" 
said  the  sister. 

Aunt  Hannah  raised  herself  up  from  her 
work,  with  a  broad  smile  on  her  face,  and  look- 
ing up  full  at  the  white  sister,  said : 

"De  Lord  knows  I  ain't  stole  nuthin',  and  I 
knows  I  ain't,  an'  life's  too  short  for  me  to  be 
provin'  and  'splainin'  all  de  time;  so  I  jest  goes 
on  my  way  rejoicin'.  Dey  know  dey  ain't  tellin' 
the  truf,  and  dey'll  feel  ashamed  and  quit  after 
awhile.  If  I  can  please  de  Lord  dat  is  enough 
for  me." 

Let  us  remember  this,  and  be  satisfied  with 
pleasing  the  Lord.  And  let  us  not  be  too  critical 
of  others.  Says  Marcus  Aurelius : 

"How  much  trouble  he  avoids  who  does  not 
look  to  see  what  his  neighbor  says,  or  does,  or 
thinks,  but  only  to  what  he  does  himself,  that  it 
may  be  just  and  pure." 

There  is  always  danger  of  forming  ourselves 
into  a  mutual  admiration  society,  and  nothing  is 
more  of  a  hindrance  to  progress.  Self-satisfac- 
tion is  fatal  to  self-development.  And  here  our 
enemies  may  have  been  all  actual  benefit  to  us, 

[54] 


ON  ENEMIES 

in  order  that  we  might  not  think  more  of  our- 
selves than  we  ought  to  have  done. 

Somebody  once  sent  me  a  printed  motto  which 
I  keep  over  my  working-desk,  and  read  often. 
I  do  not  know  who,  seeing  it,  recognized  in  it  a 
message  for  me,  but  I  pass  it  along  to  you.  It 
is  called  "The  Foot  Path  to  Peace,"  and  is  signed 
by  Henry  Van  Dyke,  whose  writings  show  such 
a  wonderful  appreciation  of  nature  as  God's  best 
minister.  It  reads  as  follows : 

"To  be  glad  of  life  because  it  gives  you  the 
chance  to  love  and  to  work  and  to  play  and  to 
look  up  at  the  stars;  to  be  satisfied  with  your 
possessions  but  not  contented  with  yourself  until 
you  have  made  the  best  of  them ;  to  despise  noth- 
ing in  the  world  except  falsehood  and  meanness, 
and  to  fear  nothing  except  cowardice ;  to  be  gov- 
erned by  your  admirations  rather  than  by  your 
disgusts;  to  covet  nothing  that  is  your  neigh- 
bor's except  his  kindness  of  heart  and  gentleness 
of  manners;  to  think  seldom  of  your  enemies, 
often  of  your  friends  and  every  day  of  Christ, 
and  to  spend  as  much  time  as  you  can  with  body 
and  spirit  in  God's  out-of-doors — these  are  little 
guide  posts  on  the  foot  path  to  peace." 

There  is  a  whole  sermon  in  it.    "To  be  gov- 

[55] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

erned  by  your  admirations  rather  than  by  your 
disgusts" — how  many  of  us  do  this?  Think 
what  a  different  atmosphere  we  should  breathe, 
how  much  pleasanter  our  outlook  on  life  if  we 
made  this  our  rule.  Again,  "think  seldom  of 
your  enemies,  often  of  your  friends  and  daily  of 
Christ," — there  is  another  "guide  post  on  the 
foot  path  to  peace"  which  it  is  worth  our  while 
to  linger  over  and  study.  It  is  too  easy  to  think 
often  of  our  enemies,  to  poison  our  lives  and 
vitiate  our  whole  moral  atmosphere  by  dwelling 
upon  their  faults. 

The  truth  is  they  are  not  worth  our  thinking 
about — unless  we  can  do  so  kindly  and  helpfully. 
We  take  our  hosts  of  friends  as  a  matter  of 
course  and  seldom  congratulate  ourselves  that 
we  have  so  many  and  such  excellent  ones;  but 
our  one  enemy !  Alas !  we  let  him  or  her  sully 
our  spirit  with  all  uncharitableness.  She  is  not 
worth  it.  A  high,  clean  soul  is  infinitely  better. 

Let  us  walk  together  in  the  foot  path  to  peace. 
We  can  find  it  if  we  will ;  we  can  make  for  our- 
selves all  these  little  guide  posts  along  the  way. 
And  we  shall  be  much  the  better  women  and 
much  better  fitted  for  life. 

We  have   always   before  us   the   individual 

[56] 


ON  ENEMIES 

problem.  We  can  solve  it,  not  in  crowds  nor  in 
co-operation,  but  by  wrestling  with  all  cowardice 
and  meanness  and  narrowness  and  pettiness,  and 
by  looking  up  "to  the  stars"  and  beyond  them. 
Let  us  try. 

Above  all,  let  us  love  one  another,  and  not 
hesitate  to  say  the  loving  word.  Flattery  is 
poison,  but  sincere  approbation  is  a  wholesome 
stimulant.  Let  us  speak  the  simple  truth.  A 
foolish  reserve  often  makes  us  withhold  it.  It 
seals  the  lips  to  the  expression  of  the  heart.  It 
is  like  locking  the  gate  of  a  garden  where  roses 
bloom.  Let  their  beauty  and  perfume  be  freely 
given.  True  love  never  harms;  it  helps  and  en- 
nobles. For  love  is  the  fulfilling  of  the  law. 
"Love  your  enemies." 


[57] 


VI 

ON  MRS.  GUMMIDGE 

£  £^  T"ES,"   sighed  that  immortal  woman, 

|[          "I'm  a  lone,  lorn  creetur'  and  not 

only  everything  goes  contrary  with 

me,  but  I  go  contrary  with  everything.  I'd  better 

die  and  be  a  riddance."     We  all  know  Mrs. 

Gummidges.     They  exist  to-day  in  the  family, 

in  public  life,  in  literature.     Worse  yet,  there 

are  Mrs.  Gummidges  of  both  sexes. 

If  you  venture  some  remarks  during  a  dis- 
cussion which  call  forth  praise  from  all  the  rest, 
Mrs.  Gummidge  looks  superior;  she  regrets  that 
you  should  have  been  guilty  of  misstatement;  or 
she  notes  a  discrepancy  between  what  you  say  to- 
day and  some  other  thing  you  said  last  year; 
and  how  came  you  to  fall  into  error  when  the 
magazines  or  the  newspapers  have  given  such 
frequent  opportunities  for  you  to  keep  right? 
And  after  making  you  feel  too  small  and  insig- 

[58] 


ON  MRS.  GUMMIDGE 

nificant  even  to  have  an  opinion  of  your  own, 
much  less  to  express  it,  she  remarks  that  she 
does  not  suppose  other  people  notice  your  errors, 
and  that  she  only  mentioned  it  because  her  own 
critical  acumen  forced  her  to. 

"Mrs.  Gummidge's  was  rather  a  fretful  dis- 
position," says  little  David,  uand  she  whimpered 
sometimes  more  than  was  comfortable  for  other 
parties  in  so  small  an  establishment.  I  was  very 
sorry  for  her,  but  there  were  moments  when  I 
thought  how  much  more  agreeable  it  would  be 
if  Mrs.  Gummidge  had  a  convenient  apartment 
of  her  own  to  retire  to,  and  had  stayed  there 
until  her  spirits  revived."  Alas!  but  our  Mrs. 
Gummidge,  if  she  had  such  an  apartment,  would 
refuse  to  seek  its  solitude  and  there  bury  or  nurse 
her  griefs ;  for  she  belongs  to  that  class  who  are 
gregarious.  She  insists  that  her  whole  world 
shall  share  in  her  discomforts,  bear  her  woes, 
carry  her  burdens. 

Mrs.  Gummidge,  in  short,  was  the  queen  of 
pessimists.  True,  after  being  a  lone,  lorn  cree- 
tur*  for  many  years  she  developed  after  the  most 
surprising  fashion  into  a  cheerful,  busy  worker. 
But  so  does  any  confirmed  pessimist  when  he  or 
she  realizes  that  there  is  honest,  earnest  work 

[59] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

cut  out  for  his  or  her  hand  and  no  other.  Those 
who  discourse  the  most  fluently  of  the  anguish 
and  bitter  woe  of  life  are  seldom  those  who  have 
felt  the  iron  of  sorrow  in  their  own  souls.  They 
have  more  often  been  soured  by  little  disappoint- 
ments, tormented  by  the  pin-pricks  of  a  super- 
ficial existence;  they  know  little  of  the  heavy 
griefs  which  discipline  the  soul. 

We  have  been  taught  to  believe  that  in  the 
wise  economy  of  nature  nothing  superfluous  has 
been  created.  But  it  certainly  seems  as  if  pes- 
simism, as  a  confirmed  and  habitual  state  of 
mind,  is  a  quality  of  which  the  world  has  no 
need.  You  and  I  have  no  right  to  drag  our 
ulone-and-lorn-ness"  before  our  little  public  and 
make  other  people  miserable  when  we  might 
make  them  happy.  The  confirmed  pessimist  is 
as  much  in  need  of  missionary  work  as  ever  was 
the  wild  Hottentot  or  the  Fiji  Islander.  I 
learned  a  hymn  in  childhood  which  was  calcu- 
lated to  impress  upon  the  juvenile  mind  the 
power  of  a  spoken  word  by  showing  how  a  word 
once  spoken  is  gone  from  us  forever,  but  will  go 
on  for  ages  exerting  a  positive  influence.  The 
logic  of  this  hymn  may  have  been  far-fetched, 
but  I  think  if  people  were  more  generally 

[60] 


ON   MRS.   GUMMIDGE 

brought  up  on  it  there  would  be  a  noticeable 
diminution  in  the  amount  of  useless  talking  done 
in  the  world. 

What  right  have  we  to  say  words  that  shall 
depress  or  discourage  the  hopes  of  other  women  ? 
Hundreds  of  women  lead  lonely  lives  at  home 
because  they  are  so  busy  with  material  things 
that  they  have  no  time  for  "high  thinking." 
What  right  have  we  to  utter  careless  words 
which  shall  fail  to  raise  their  standards  and 
quicken  their  desire  for  higher  living?  The 
prophets  of  old  felt  that  they  had  a  message  to 
bear  to  humanity  and  their  hearts  burned  within 
them  until  they  uttered  it.  So  ought  all  good  and 
earnest  women  to  feel;  and  we  may  at  least  be 
sure  we  send  forth  no  depressing  or  unhealthy 
influences.  "Of  one  thing  I  am  sure,"  says  a 
writer  who  has  brought  comfort  to  many  women, 
"that  I  have  never  written  anything  without  a 
prayer  in  my  heart  that  somewhere  or  somehow 
a  human  soul  might  be  the  better  for  it.  After 
all,  we  only  hold  the  pen.  The  dear  God 
guides."  And  this  may  apply  to  all  of  us,  if  we 
will. 

I  like  Margaret  Deland's  definition  of  happi- 
ness as  "thinking  straight  and  seeing  clear,  and 
[61] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

having  a  true  perception  of  the  value  of  things," 
but  before  reaching  this  high  mental  standpoint 
we  must  have  many  a  bonfire  of  what  is  narrow 
and  feeble  in  us.  A  well-ordered  home  and  a 
mind  filled  with  noble  thoughts — what  better 
equipment  can  we  have  for  the  discouragement 
of  Gummidge-ism  ?  Perhaps  the  multiplication 
of  these  is  responsible  for  the  fact  that  we  are 
gradually  outgrowing  the  old  habit  of  criticising 
each  other,  and  learning  to  see  and  love  the  good 
qualities  in  other  women;  we  are  even  mastering 
that  more  difficult  task  of  learning  to  shut  our 
eyes  to  their  shortcomings  in  the  remembrance 
that  none  of  us  is  perfect  and  that  even  we  our- 
selves have  our  limitations.  And  so  we  learn 
the  great  lesson  of  forbearance  and  charity,  and 
we  become  able  to  take  our  friends  at  their  best. 
The  woman  who  is  truly  refined  or  who  is  at- 
taining unto  real  culture  will  not  air  her  griev- 
ances in  public  places.  There  is  a  type  of  the 
feminine  gender  that  delights  in  holding  forth 
on  the  subject  of  her  family  or  her  neighborhood 
troubles  in  the  street  cars,  and  who  enjoys  the 
more  or  less  sympathetic  attention  of  her  fellow- 
passengers.  But  nobody  would  be  guilty  of  de- 
scribing her  as  "truly  cultured  and  refined." 


ON   MRS.   GUMMIDGE 

There  is  a  kind  of  culture  that  is  better  than  the 
ability  to  appreciate  Charles  Lamb,  or  even  to 
follow  one's  favorite  authors  in  delicious  dreams 
where  eternity  is  entered  and  the  fortunate 
aspirant  is  admitted  to  the  society  of  the  Olym- 
pians. Very  true,  it  cannot  be  acquired  by 
cramming  with  the  lyrical  or  dramatic  endings 
of  Shakespeare's  lines,  or  the  styles  of  great 
artists  whose  names  are  difficult  to  spell  and  terri- 
fying to  pronounce.  It  is  something  deeper,  less 
selfish  and  more  productive  of  good  to  the  world 
around  us. 

It  is  in  our  power  to  make  our  lives  a  benefi- 
cence to  those  who  come  within  our  circle. 
Whether  we  will  or  no,  the  club  movement  is 
proving  such  a  beneficence.  Let  us  resolve  that 
we  will  enlarge  our  vision,  that  we  will  broaden 
our  sphere,  that  we  will  deepen  our  love  to 
humanity,  that  we  will  be  true  to  our  best  selves. 

Let  us  see  to  it  that  our  hearts  beat  true ;  that 
they  beat  with  sympathy  and  love  and  sisterly 
charity;  that  they  beat  with  high  hope  for  the 
future  and  a  growing  desire  to  help,  and  not 
hinder  the  work  of  making  the  world  a  better 
place.  God  gives  his  prophets  now  as  of  old 
a  message  to  his  people.  Life  with  too  many 

[63] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

women  is  a  tread-mill.  They  need  all  the  stimu- 
lus they  can  get.  If  we  realize  how  the  things 
we  say  and  the  things  we  do  as  individuals  affect 
others,  we  should  try  at  least  to  guard  our  lips. 
We  little  think  of  the  wounded  souls  near  us 
ready  to  drop  the  burden  of  life  because  of  the 
dreary  lack  of  a  friendly  word ;  we  are  not  con- 
scious of  the  bereaved  heart  within  our  own 
radius,  perhaps  dumb  with  despair;  we  do  not 
realize  that  eager  hearts  are  waiting  silently  for 
some  message  of  love  and  comfort;  and  so  we 
are  careless  and  blind  and  cynical;  and  so  we 
neglect  our  opportunities  to  be  "God's  messen- 
gers." 

In  our  anxiety  to  avoid  being  a  "mush  of  con- 
cession," as  Emerson  puts  it,  let  us  not  be  that 
most  uncomfortable  person,  the  Chronic  Ob- 
jector. I  suppose  it  is  true  that  sometimes  we 
are  pessimistic  from  physical  causes.  Young 
people  are  usually  inclined  to  morbid  specula- 
tions. I  remember  the  sensation  when  I  was 
young.  I  thought  it  came  from  a  deep  apprecia- 
tion of  life's  mysteries;  in  reality  it  was  the  need 
of  spring  medicine  and  liver  pills.  At  a  very 
early  age  I  sought  to  give  vent  to  pent-up  gloom 
and  despair  in  blank  verse  patterned  after  Mil- 

[64] 


ON   MRS.   GUMMIDGE 

ton  at  his  best;  but  I  committed  the  folly  of  re- 
peating the  first  stanzas  to  my  older  brother, 
who  ridiculed  me  so  unmercifully  that  my  poetic 
pessimism  was  nipped  in  the  bud.  Blushing  with 
mortification  I  sought  to  distract  his  mind  from 
my  poetry  by  playing  at  "see-saw"  with  him; 
but  he  persisted,  when  his  end  of  the  board  was 
uppermost,  in  screaming  out  my  beloved  though 
gloomy  stanzas  in  a  derisive  tone.  It  was  very 
hard  to  bear.  But  the  world  owes  him  a  debt 
of  gratitude — and  so  do  I. 

None  of  us  is  so  humble  that  cheerful  op- 
timism is  not  in  some  sort  a  duty.  Not  that  we 
should  go  to  extremes;  and  the  out-and-out  op- 
timist is  seldom  a  good  observer.  But  we  should 
not  indulge  ourselves  in  sarcasm,  nor  gloomy 
forebodings,  nor  in  saying  things  that  may 
be  stumbling  blocks  in  the  way  of  weaker 
sisters. 

How  much  better  to  live  a  self-contained  life 
— to  maintain  a  steady  poise  of  character  so  that 
we  shall  be  able  to  enjoy  to  the  fullest  the  win- 
ter's work  and  the  summer's  play.  To  be  mis- 
tresses of  ourselves,  to  be  calm  and  serene  under 
all  provocation,  to  be  restful  in  ourselves  and 
therefore  to  others,  to  keep  the  love  of  God  in 

[65] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

our  hearts  simply  and  humbly  is  to  make  of  life 
a  well-spring  of  joy,  and  to  make  of  ourselves  a 
blessing  and  an  inspiration  to  those  around  us. 
There  are  so  many  tired  souls,  so  many  discour- 
aged hearts,  so  many  narrow-visioned  ones,  so 
many  weak  ones  that  need  the  sunshine  and 
courage  and  light  and  strength — how  dare  we 
indulge  ourselves  in  weakness  or  in  discourage- 
ment? 

When  we  are  all  through  with  life  and  the 
affairs  of  this  world  are  only  a  scroll  of  the  past, 
if  we  shall  find  that  a  pathway  has  been 
smoothed  for  somebody  or  a  burden  lightened 
for  some  one  else;  if  we  shall  find  that  even  one 
sorrowing,  heavy-hearted  woman  found  comfort 
and  the  source  of  all  comfort  from  any  word  or 
any  effort  of  ours,  shall  we  then  ask — "Was  it 
worth  while?" 

Let  us  make  a  little  set  of  rules  that  can  be 
easily  learned  and  less  easily  lived  by.  First, 
then,  that  we  will  seek  the  peace  and  the  strength 
that  come  from  Mother  Nature — for  that 
is  the  sort  that  will  make  better  women 
of  us. 

That  we  will  make  our  lives  henceforth  more 
profitable  than  ever. 

[66] 


ON   MRS.   GUMMIDGE 

That  we  will  begin  by  doing  everything  re- 
quired of  us  whether  it  happens  to  be  agreeable 
or  not. 

That  we  will  make  all  days  brighter  for  every- 
body because  of  our  presence. 

That  we  will  seek  out  the  poor,  the  unac- 
quainted, the  shabby  and  retiring  people  and 
make  them  glad  they  belong  to  the  same  world 
as  we  do. 

That  we  will,  in  everything,  be  true  to  our- 
selves; for  then  it  shall  follow,  as  night  follows 
day,  that  we  cannot  be  untrue  to  any  other 
woman. 

That  we  will  learn  the  gentle  art  of  saying 
nothing  uncharitable  of  any  person,  no  matter 
how  great  the  provocation. 

That  the  spirit  of  the  right  life  means  a 
broader  charity,  a  greater  tolerance  and  a  more 
universal,  practical  love  for  humanity;  and  that 
if  we  are  not  learning  all  these  we  are  missing 
our  opportunity. 

We  might  as  well  finish  up  with  Saint  Paul : 
"And  now  abideth  faith,  hope,  charity,  these 
three ;  but  the  greatest  of  these  is  charity."  Good 
for  Saint  Paul ;  old  bachelor  though  he  was,  he 
had  the  requisites  necessary  to  make  a  good  all- 

[67] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

round  woman  himself.  And  were  he  alive  to- 
day, he  wouldn't  say  a  thing  about  silence  in  the 
churches,  either. 


[68J 


VII 

ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 

THE  charge  is  made  against  American 
women,  and  it  is  too  true,  that  we  lack 
repose  of  manner.  How  can  we  show 
that  in  our  manner  which  we  lack  in  our  natures? 
And  how  can  we  possess  repose  of  the  soul  when 
we  never  allow  ourselves  a  minute  to  catch  up 
with  ourselves,  to  commune  with  the  silent  forces 
of  nature,  to  inhale  the  strength  and  calmness 
and  courage  that  we  might  exhale  again  in  the 
fragrance  which  we  call,  in  the  rare  instances 
when  we  behold  it  in  others,  repose  of  manner? 
Life  for  the  most  of  us  is  an  insane  scramble  to 
catch  up  with  things — and  not  half  the  time  do 
we  know  or  care  whether  they  are  things  worth 
catching  up  with ;  nor  are  we  satisfied  if  we  suc- 
ceed for  a  moment  in  reaching  them.  Once  in 
a  while  the  futility  of  the  chase  comes  over  us  in 
a  brief  gleam  of  reason,  but  others  around  us 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

are  hurrying  through  life  after  the  unattainable, 
and  we  forget  and  scramble  on,  too,  in  uncon- 
scious emulation  of  the  old  Scotch  saying,  "The 
de'il  take  the  hindmost." 

If  our  whole  existence  is  made  up  of  excite- 
ment— no  matter  whether  we  term  it  that  or 
disguise  it  under  the  name  of  endless  activity, 
how  shall  we  establish  that  serenity  of  soul  with- 
out which  the  real  nature  cannot  expand,  nor 
the  reality  of  noble  womanhood  become  the  guid- 
ing principle  of  life  ?  Those  feverish  mentalities 
who  demand  front  seats  at  the  great  pageant  of 
life  with  a  constant  change  of  scenes,  do  not 
know  true  serenity.  They  are  infected  with  the 
malaria  of  inefficiency  and  crave  excitement  as 
an  ague  patient  craves  a  quieting  draft.  They 
miss  the  delight  of  relaxation  and  have  no  con- 
ception of  the  joys  of  quiet  leisure.  Self-com- 
munion is  unknown  to  them  and  they  are  utter 
strangers  to  themselves.  They  are  in  a  whirl 
that  sucks  them  ever  onward  and  downward. 
Serenity  is  an  unknown  word  to  them  and  they 
know  it  not,  either  at  home  or  abroad;  while 
to  be  alone  with  their  own  thoughts  is  a  dis- 
comfort they  cannot  endure. 

Emerson  says  our  real  life  is  in  the  silent  mo- 

[70] 


ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 

ments,  and  many  of  us  have  realized  this  during 
the  vacation  season,  when  we  have  stumbled 
upon  serenity  in  country  byways,  by  the  sea- 
shore or  in  the  solitude  of  city  homes,  when 
"everybody"  has  gone  away.  Stevenson  declares 
that  gentleness  and  cheerfulness  are  the  greatest 
virtues,  and  above  all  other  morality.  There  are 
thousands  of  women  who  do  not  know  how  to 
rest,  who  cannot  enjoy  the  silent  moments. 
Blessed  be  she  who  knows  that  the  inner  life 
does  not  receive  its  highest  pleasure  from  the 
doing  of  things;  who  finds  definite  joy  in  acces- 
sions of  serenity,  whether  these  come  in  the  silent 
hours  when  the  grate  fire  is  dying,  or  during  the 
mid-day  rest  or  in  the  pauses  in  conversation. 

What  should  we  do  if  we  were  suddenly  iso- 
lated? Be  oppressed  with  intolerable  loneliness 
at  first,  no  doubt;  and  then  we  should  begin  to 
think.  I  sometimes  think  it  would  be  a  blessed 
thing  if  every  woman  were  obliged  to  go  into 
retreat  occasionally,  as  the  good  Catholics  do. 
The  silence  of  a  quiet  room  where  she  could  be 
undisturbed  and  could  spend  a  few  days  in  think- 
ing out  the  problems  of  life,  even  if  she  were 
not  spiritually  inclined  enough  to  seek  a  higher 
communion,  would  be  of  inestimable  benefit  to 

[71] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

the  average  woman.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  too 
much  of  attrition  with  other  human  beings.  A 
stone  that  rolls  ever  about  restlessly  in  the  rush- 
ing waters  of  a  strong  current  becomes  polished 
off  to  look  and  feel  like  every  other  stone  in  its 
neighborhood.  So  we  lose  our  individuality  and 
come  to  have  no  atmosphere  of  our  own. 

There  are  women  who  can  never  endure  their 
own  company  for  the  space  of  half  an  hour. 
Their  one  desire  is  to  avoid  themselves — to  hide 
from  themselves  in  the  company  of  others.  Of 
such  we  are  not  talking,  although  they  are  not 
utterly  hopeless;  since  it  would  not  be  impossible 
that  loneliness  or  isolation  from  their  kind  should 
develop  the  habit  of  thinking,  even  in  them. 
But  to  the  woman  who  wants  to  be  individual, 
who  wants  to  be  an  inspiration  and  a  help  to 
others — if  she  only  had  time — I  would  urge  the 
appropriation  of  just  a  little  bit  of  time  every 
day  or  every  night  for  getting  acquainted  with 
her  real  self,  for  the  cultivation  of  her  power 
of  thought. 

In  this  way  we  may  minister  to  the  inner  needs 
of  the  soul,  develop  love  and  patience  and  the 
helpful  instinct  which  makes  of  women  what 
God  meant  them  to  be:  His  messengers  to 

[72] 


ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 

humankind.  Just  as  the  observance  of  the  Sab- 
bath is  a  wise  thing  from  a  physiological  point 
of  view,  so  is  self-communion  and  its  breathing- 
spaces  a  blessing  to  the  intellectual  world. 

Not  that  we  should  cease  our  activities  utterly, 
or  take  time  for  morbid  contemplation  of  our 
own  peculiarities  or  tendencies.  There  is  a 
great  deal  of  work  to  be  done,  and  work  that 
seems  to  be  meant  for  our  own  hands  and  no 
other.  Only  we  must  learn  to  discriminate  be- 
tween actual  service  and  aimless  work  that  ac- 
complishes nothing,  even  for  ourselves.  And 
service  should  enrich  the  giver  before  all  others, 
should  it  not  ? 

Again,  serenity  is  not  idleness.  The  most  ef- 
fective workers  are  those  who  are  never  flurried 
and  hurried,  who  do  not  lose  their  balance  in  the 
turmoil  of  every-day  living,  nor  rush  about  in 
fussy  excitement.  We  must  be  sure  to  do  some- 
thing— much,  for  others,  and  we  shall  find  our 
days  crowded  full  as  they  grow  shorter  by  the 
almanac;  but  it  is  our  own  fault  if  we  get  flus- 
tered and  worried,  if  we  allow  our  activities  to 
destroy  our  serenity  of  soul  or  hamper  the  inner 
life. 

This  atmosphere  of  poise  in  which  the  nicely 

[73] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

adjusted  balance  of  our  powers  may  be  main- 
tained is  a  habit — a  mode  of  life.  It  is  often 
a  matter  of  temperament,  but  it  may  be  acquired 
and  nobody  needs  it  more  than  she  who  is  born 
without  it.  Some  are  blessed  by  the  fairy  god- 
mother with  happier  dispositions  than  others. 
Still  there  is  no  despair  for  any  of  us ;  if  we  have 
not  the  temperament  which  makes  for  happiness, 
it  is  our  first  business  to  acquire  it.  Why  go 
through  this  world  perpetually  disgruntled  when 
the  world  will  concede  so  much  to  a  smile  ? 

Let  us  then  develop  this  sort  of  spiritual  capi- 
tal as  the  main  necessity  of  life.  Let  us  not  toil 
unprofitably  nor  become  engulfed  in  activity  for 
its  own  sake.  Let  us  measure  out  for  ourselves 
only  just  so  much  of  play  as  we  can  do  well  with- 
out losing  our  balance  or  frittering  ourselves 
away  uselessly.  It  will  take  more  self-denial  for 
some  of  us  than  to  go  the  other  way.  It  is  al- 
ways easier  drifting  with  the  tide  than  resisting 
it — even  though  it  be  towards  the  whirlpool. 

A  woman  with  no  atmosphere  is  one  of  the 
most  uninteresting  objects  in  the  world.  A 
woman  should  be  an  individual ;  more  than  that, 
she  should  possess  a  distinct  individuality.  She 
should  suggest  to  those  with  whom  she  comes 

[74] 


ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 

most  in  contact  something  bright  and  beautiful 
or  soft  and  restful.  How  can  she,  if  she  be  un- 
easy, restless  and  strenuous?  Certain  women 
come  into  a  room  or  a  house  like  an  inspiration ; 
they  suggest  an  exhilarating  breath  of  June  air, 
or  the  great  calmness  of  a  starry  night.  Such 
women  are  worthy  to  be  called  God's  benefi- 
cences. They  are  like  the  beautiful  rose  tree, 
scenting  the  atmosphere  with  fragrance  and 
making  all  the  world  aware  of  June  and  summer 
and  all  bright  things.  And  unless  we  do  some- 
times "chant  in  thoughts  and  paint  in  words," 
even  though  it  be  in  our  secret  soul  of  souls,  we 
can  never  hope  to  be  numbered  with  such.  We 
forget  that  a  wise  prophet  once  said  there  is  a 
time  to  think,  as  well  as  a  time  to  work  and  a 
time  to  sing  and  a  time  to  dance.  And  we  need 
to  stop  and  think  more  than  we  need  to  do  any 
of  these  other  things. 

Ruskin's  words  should  be  emblazoned  on  a 
card  and  hung  before  the  eyes  of  every  restless 
woman.  "And  to  get  peace,  if  you  do  want  it, 
make  for  yourselves  nests  of  pleasant  thoughts. 
Those  are  nests  on  the  sea,  indeed,  but  safe  be- 
yond all  others.  Do  you  know  what  fairy 
palaces  you  may  build  of  beautiful  thoughts, 

[75] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

proof  against  all  adversity?  Bright  fancies, 
satisfied  memories,  noble  histories,  faithful  say- 
ings, treasure  houses  of  precious  and  restful 
thoughts,  which  care  cannot  disturb,  nor  pain 
make  gloomy,  nor  poverty  take  away  from  us; 
houses  built  without  hands  for  our  souls  to  live 
in."  Why  not  take  this  for  our  rule,  and  devote 
some  little  time  every  day,  say  a  half  hour  at 
dusk  or  even  at  night  after  the  house  is  still,  to 
building  ourselves  nests  of  pleasant  thoughts? 
Surely  it  would  pay. 

It  rests  with  the  individual  woman  whether 
she  will  be  like  a  rose  tree  full  of  brightness  and 
fragrance,  a  help  and  an  inspiration ;  or  whether 
she  will  waste  herself  in  a  mad  endeavor  to  keep 
up  with  the  pell-mell,  hop,  skip  and  jump  of 
modern  life.  Shall  we  stop  occasionally  long 
enough  to  plant  the  seed  germs  that  will  blossom 
later  into  flower  and  fruit?  Or  shall  we  de- 
generate into  mere  replicas  of  other  women 
who  wear  good  clothes,  do  and  say  the 
conventional,  commonplace  thing,  and  are  as 
uninteresting  as  a  sunset  without  a  flush  of 
color  ? 

No;  let  us  give  ourselves  pause.  Let  us  take 
stock  of  ourselves  and  see  if  we  are  making  the 

[76] 


ON  MENTAL  ATTITUDES 

most  of  our  talents,  "building  for  ourselves  fairy 
palaces,  proof  against  all  adversity."  And  let 
us  not  do  it  for  ourselves  alone,  but  that  we  may 
give  others  that  "which  care  may  not  disturb 
nor  pain  take  away." 

And  let  me  whisper  a  way  to  keep  in  the  atti- 
tude of  serenity.  Commit  to  memory  some  help- 
ful verse  and  say  it  over  to  yourselves  whenever 
you  have  time,  or,  more  important  even,  when- 
ever you  get  cross.  If  you  cannot  pin  it  to  your 
memory,  pin  it  to  your  mirror,  or  on  your  pin- 
cushion, if  you  are  so  old-fashioned  as  to  use 
one. 

I  will  tell  you  a  secret.  On  my  mirror  is  hung 
a  ribbon  banner  with  the  following  printed 
thereon  : 

MY  SYMPHONY 

To  live  content  with  small  means ; 
To  seek  elegance  rather  than  luxury, 
And  refinement  rather  than  fashion ; 
To  be  worthy,  not  respectable ; 

And  wealthy,  not  rich; 
To  study  hard,  think  quietly, 

Talk  gently,  act  frankly; 

[77] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

To  listen  to  stars  and  birds, 

To  babes  and  sages 

With  open  heart. 
To  bear  all  cheerfully, 

Do  all  bravely,  await  occasions, 

Hurry  never; 

In  a  word,  to  let  the  spiritual,  unbidden  and  un- 
conscious, 

Grow  up  through  the  common. 
This  is  to  be  my  symphony. 

— William  Ellery  Charming. 


VIII 

ON  THE  ESSENTIALS  OF  HAPPINESS 

{  4fT^  HAT'S  a  pleasant  cemetery,  isn't  it?" 
asked  somebody  of  an  old  lady  on  a 
railroad  train  one  day. 

"I  don't  know,"  was  the  answer,  "I  am  not 
looking  for  cemeteries.  I  am  looking  for  flower- 
gardens  ;  I  find  lots  of  beautiful  ones,  too." 

There  was  a  whole  sermon  in  the  old  lady's 
remark.  How  often  we  go  through  life  watch- 
ing out  for  cemeteries,  forgetting  that  flower- 
gardens  are  much  more  numerous  as  well  as  far 
saner,  pleasanter  and  healthier.  We  get  into 
such  a  habit  of  noticing  the  uncomfortable  con- 
ditions of  life  and  ignoring  the  other  kind  that 
are  always  so  much  more  plenty,  that  we  forget 
our  mercies.  A  teacher  once  told  me  of  a  school- 
boy who  was  so  optimistic  in  his  attitude  toward 
life  that  he  never  saw  the  unpleasant  side  of 
things.  If  he  is  given  ten  problems,  and  after 

[79] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

laboring  patiently  all  the  morning  over  them, 
seven  are  incorrect,  he  smiles  triumphantly  and 
says,  "Well,  I  got  three  of  'em  right,  anyhow." 
Would  that  there  were  more  of  him ! 

It  all  depends  on  our  view  of  life.  Happiness 
is  a  condition  of  the  mind;  we  are  happy  if  we 
train  ourselves  to  think  so;  not  to  expect  too 
much  of  life  or  of  other  people,  and  to  keep  the 
sun  shining  in  our  heaven.  On  the  contrary,  if 
we  allow  ourselves  to  worry  and  fret,  to  miss 
the  joy  of  little  things,  to  lose  sight  of  all  the 
greatness  and  nobleness  that  come  into  every- 
day life  (if  only  we  train  our  eyes  to  see),  we 
can  easily  lose  the  best  happiness  in  the  world, 
that  of  realizing  the  beauty  of  humility,  un- 
selfishness, good  temper,  right  living,  high  stand- 
ards and  purity  of  heart  that  lies  all  around  us. 
There  are  plenty  of  mental  and  moral  flower- 
gardens  on  every  side,  if  only  we  are  not  blind, 
if  only  we  do  not  look  for  cemeteries. 

Now,  let  us  make  up  our  minds  whether  we 
care  to  be  happy  all  the  time  or  not.  "Why,  of 
course  we  do;  how  foolish  such  a  question!'7 
Then  let  us  see  how  small  a  matter  happiness  is, 
and  then  decide  whether  it  is  worth  having.  If 
your  definition  of  happiness  is  an  ecstasy,  a  de- 

[so] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

lirium  of  joy,  a  flood  of  emotion  that  shall  engulf 
you  in  an  occasional  paroxysm,  you  might  as  well 
give  up  asking  for  a  steady  diet  of  happiness. 
But  after  we  arrive  at  years  of  discretion  we 
generally  know  that  waves  of  delirium  do  not 
constitute  pure  happiness.  It  is  not  until  we 
cease  looking  for  impossible  sustained  attitudes 
of  mind  that  we  come  to  realize  what  happiness 
is.  Not  until  we  have  lived  long  enough  to 
accept  the  possibilities  and  let  go  of  the  imprac- 
tical. 

The  clouds  are  a  blessed  place  for  our  heads, 
but  the  earth  is  the  only  legitimate  place  in  this 
incarnation  for  our  feet.  Antaeus,  you  remem- 
ber, who  had  such  victory  in  wrestling  with  Her- 
cules, was  the  son  of  earth,  and  it  was  not  until 
Hercules  succeeded  in  getting  him  off  the  earth 
and  into  the  air  that  he  was  able  to  throttle  him. 
It  is  very  important  that  woman  should  pay  a 
good  deal  of  attention  to  her  circulation  to  pre- 
vent her  feet  going  to  sleep  or  her  head  getting 
giddy. 

We  talk  altogether  too  much.    Hundreds  of 

women  (to  estimate  it  modestly)  chatter  from 

the  moment  they  open  their  eyes  in  the  morning 

until  they  close  them  after  everybody  else  is  tired 

[81] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

out  for  the  night.  They  cannot  bear  to  be  alone 
for  a  moment,  facing  the  emptiness  of  their  own 
hearts  and  brains,  and  so  they  talk,  talk,  talk 
the  precious  hours  away,  without  ever  saying 
anything.  Oh,  what  would  I  give  for  the  hours 
these  women  waste  in  talk  that  amounts  to  noth- 
ing but  fruitless  sound? 

Again,  we  read  too  much.  Every  new  volume 
of  history,  essay,  science  (in  easy  doses),  bibli- 
ography, and  especially  of  fiction,  filters  through 
our  minds  like  water  through  a  sieve.  We  take 
in  an  enormous  amount  of  fuel,  but  it  all  goes 
up  the  intellectual  chimney  in  smoke.  Reading 
does  no  good  unless  it  teaches  us  to  think  and 
gives  us  something  new  to  think  about.  If  we 
read  so  much  that  our  intellectual  powers  become 
inoperative,  to  what  end  is  it  ?  We  need  to  think 
more ;  and  to  think  to  any  purpose  we  must  learn 
to  face  ourselves  alone.  And  it  is  only  by  seek- 
ing and  finding  our  true  selves  that  we  can  come 
into  a  full  comprehension  of  what  a  full,  wide 
every-day  sort  of  thing  true  happiness  is,  and 
how  easily  it  may  be  obtained,  after  all.  We 
may  have  flower-gardens  in  our  own  souls,  an' 
we  will. 

Said  the  Rev.  Dr.  Burns:    "To  simply  per- 

[82] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

petuate  low  aims,  frivolous  characters,  mammon- 
worshipping  beings,  is  to  curse  rather  than  to 
bless.  This  is  not  the  end  nor  kingdom  to  which 
woman  has  been  called.  A  message  has  gone 
forth — not  to  a  favored  one,  but  to  every 
woman,  whatever  may  be  her  position.  Some 
are  faithfully  and  heroically  striving  to  obey  the 
command;  others  are  indifferent.  They  are 
asleep.  But  sleep  must  give  place  to  work,  indif- 
ference to  interest,  selfish  ease  to  self-sacrifice. 
Littleness,  worldliness,  must  all  give  way  to  the 
execution  of  the  command. 

"Knowest  thou,  O  woman,  that  thou  art  come 
for  such  a  time  and  work  as  this  ?  If  indifferent, 
thou  wilt  sink  into  insignificance  and  another  will 
take  up  the  crown  and  sceptre  which  might  have 
been  thine."  Donald  Mitchell  says:  "Man 
without  some  sort  of  religion  is  at  best  a  poor 
reprobate,  a  football  of  destiny."  But  a  woman 
without  religion  is  worse.  She  is  a  flame  without 
heat,  a  rainbow  without  color,  a  flower  without 
perfume.  That  sweet  trustfulness,  that  abiding 
love,  that  endearing  hope  which  man  needs  in 
every  scheme  of  life,  is  not  then  hers  to  give. 
But  let  the  love  of  Christ  take  full  possession  of 
a  woman's  heart,  and  under  its  inspiration  let  her 

[83] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

grow  in  purity,  in  character,  till  at  last  she  come 
to  a  perfect  woman,  "to  the  measure  of  the 
stature  of  the  fullness  of  Christ" ;  then  from  all 
human  lips,  and  from  Him  who  sitteth  upon  the 
throne,  will  come  the  benediction,  "Blessed  art 
thou  among  women." 

Man  hunts  after  God  with  his  understanding 
and  fails,  often,  to  find  Him;  science  reaches 
after  God  with  its  lenses,  and  its  face  seems  like 
a  blind  man  trying  to  help  his  sight  by  using  a 
glass  eye;  logic  tries  to  soar  toward  God,  and 
waves  its  wooden  crutches  in  mimicry  to  witness; 
woman  sees  Him,  feels  Him  within,  discerns 
Him  above,  sees  Him  in  Christ.  She  feels  Him 
in  the  deepest  experiences  of  life,  and  then  she 
sees  Him  in  all  the  providential  history  of  the 
world,  in  all  creation.  It  is  by  the  heart  of 
woman  filled  with  the  Divine  power  and  beauty 
that  the  world  is  to  have  everywhere  and  retain 
immortally  the  vision  of  God.  One  of  the  most 
foolish  questions  ever  asked  is :  "What  is  going 
to  be  the  sphere  of  woman  when  she  is  so  edu- 
cated?" The  sphere?  If  she  don't  make  her 
own  we  may  stop  prophesying.  You  see  the  little 
ridge  among  the  mountains,  a  thread  of  water, 
and  you  see  it  arrested  by  rocks,  and  you  see 

[84] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

more  and  more  as  it  fills  the  chasm  behind  them 
till  it  cuts  its  way  across  the  rock,  and  through 
the  rock,  and  at  last  you  go  into  the  gorges  and 
see  the  mighty  chasms  that  have  been  cloven 
through  the  rocky  hills,  and  there  is  the  power 
that  has  done  it.  That  little  stream  has  made 
its  sphere. 

If  we  were  all  thoughtful,  high-minded,  se- 
rious, charitable,  broad-minded,  loving,  tender, 
patient,  self-sacrificing,  forgiving  and  Christ- 
like;  if  we  lived  the  best  of  which  we  are  capable 
every  day  of  our  lives,  "you  in  your  small  corner 
and  I  in  mine,"  what  a  power  for  good  would 
we  be ! — not  possibility,  but  power.  Whose  fault 
is  it  if  we  do  not  accomplish  all  we  might? 

Again,  we  put  such  false  estimates  on  life. 
Lady  Henry  Somerset  once  said:  "It  would 
be  interesting  to  analyze  how  much  real  happi- 
ness comes  to  the  man  who  has  made  or  in- 
herited a  large  fortune,  and  feels  it  necessary  to 
live  in  what  is  called  'adequate  style.'  He  builds 
himself  a  palace,  engages  a  troop  of  servants, 
begins  to  collect  pictures,  furniture  and  objects 
of  art,  and  he  little  knows  that  he  is  heaping 
upon  himself  a  world  of  trouble.  A  man  with 
a  moderate  income,  who  has  no  requirements  be- 

[85] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

yond  those  which  he  can  well  supply,  who  lives 
in  a  house  where  his  things  give  him  no  anxiety, 
but  in  refined,  tasteful  and  simple  surroundings, 
who  can  afford  to  see  his  own  friends  because  he 
cares  for  them,  and  not  a  host  of  people  who 
have  to  be  asked  because  it  is  the  right  thing  that 
they  should  be  seen  at  his  house,  is  the  really 
happy  man."  When  shall  we  learn  that  it  is  not 
the  things  we  possess,  but  the  thing  we  are  that 
makes  or  unmakes  our  life? 

It  is  only  in  the  last  hundred  years  that  we 
have  come  to  judge  men  and  women  in  propor- 
tion to  their  personal  contribution  to  humanity. 
Now  we  see  that  our  aim  must  be  to  live,  not  to 
make  a  living ;  that  we  must  get  our  culture  out 
of  our  work,  instead  of  leaving  it  till  we  grow 
too  old  or  too  rich  to  work ;  that  we  must  make 
our  work  a  medium  for  self-expression,  and 
finally  that  we  must  make  it  an  opportunity  for 
serving  others.  Vocations  tend  to  become  mat- 
ters of  such  routine  that  it  is  often  hard  to  see 
any  ideal  or  inspiration  in  them,  and  this  holds 
true  of  much  more  of  women's  work  than  of 
men's.  There's  so  little  inspiration,  so  little  of 
the  outlook  into  the  bigger  world. 

Again,  it  is  so  much  easier  to  see  the  deadness 
[86] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

in  your  own  life  than  in  other  people's.  We  see 
their  brilliant  achievements ;  we  don't  know  any- 
thing about  the  drudgery  that  has  gone  to  pro- 
duce them. 

This  life  is  no  lottery.  Nothing  worth  while 
comes  without  work.  What  comes  easily  goes 
easily.  That  which  seems  to  be  done  most  easily 
is  bought  with  the  hardest  work.  There  is  no 
royal  road  to  anything  worth  while.  We  have  to 
do  many  things  that  seem  like  the  merest 
drudgery;  but  to  do  any  blind,  dead  work  loyally 
and  faithfully  without  protesting  is  to  build 
character  and  to  get  culture.  For  what  is  culture 
but  patience,  fidelity,  quiet  wisdom,  loyalty  to 
trust — those  simple,  primitive  qualities  on  which 
human  life  is  based?  And  when  trouble  comes 
on  us,  to  whom  do  we  go?  Sometimes  to  our 
physician.  Sometimes  to  our  minister.  But  often 
we  go  to  some  woman  who  has  lived  quietly  and 
brought  up  her  children,  but  is  able  to  give  us 
the  help  that  comes  from  a  hand-grip  with  life. 

Here's  a  verse  for  you : 

"Somebody  did  a  golden  deed; 
Somebody  proved  a  friend  in  need; 
Somebody  sang  a  beautiful  song; 

[87] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

Somebody  smiled  the  whole  day  long. 
Somebody  thought,  '  'Tis  sweet  to  live' ; 
Somebody  said  'I'm  glad  to  give' ; 
Somebody  fought  a  valiant  fight; 
Somebody  lived  to  shield  the  right; 
Was  that  somebody  you?" 

"There  are,"  says  Margaret  Deland,  uas 
many  opinions  of  happiness  as  there  are  people 
in  the  world,  but  the  first  and  most  important 
distinction  which  we  must  make  is  this:  happi- 
ness is  a  spiritual  possession  and  is  independent 
of  material  things.  Happiness  is  thinking 
straight  and  seeing  clear  and  having  a  true  per- 
ception of  the  value  of  things." 

It  takes  us  a  long  time  to  find  out  that  happi- 
ness is  a  state  of  mind  which  can  be  cultivated 
rather  than  the  result  of  conditions  outside  our- 
selves. The  little  child  does  not  know  that  it  is 
seeing  its  happiest  days,  the  school-girl  does  not 
understand  how  happy  she  is,  the  young  mother 
seldom  realizes  her  own  happiness;  they  are  all 
looking  forward  with  eagerness  to  some  happi- 
ness to  come.  Contentment  is  the  truest  happi- 
ness, and  yet  if  we  were  always  simply  content 
with  our  lot  from  babyhood  up,  where  would  be 
[88] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

the  world's  progress?  It  is  the  eager  reaching 
forward  for  something  better  that  brings  prog- 
ress, which,  alas !  is  not  always  synonymous  with 
happiness. 

But  it  is  our  duty  to  cultivate  happiness,  just 
the  same.  We  can  form  the  habit  of  cheerful- 
ness and  hopefulness  and  a  courageous  spirit 
which  shall  become,  in  time,  the  very  essence  of 
happiness,  or  at  least  a  very  good  substitute  for 
it.  The  woman  who  goes  whining  through  life, 
the  woman  who  is  envious  or  self-conscious  or 
unloving  may  fasten  herself  into  a  steel  armor 
of  endurance  of  this  life,  but  she  cannot  hope  to 
be  happy;  but  the  woman  who  accepts  gladly 
the  work  close  at  her  hand,  and  thanks  God  for 
it,  plants  sunshine  in  her  own  soul  and  radiates 
happiness  from  the  heart. 

More  than  ever  women  are  learning  to  find 
and  give  out  their  happiness  in  the  home.  I 
once  heard  some  excellent  advice  given  by  a 
speaker  on  domestic  science:  "I  hold  that  it  is 
the  duty  of  every  woman  to  make  of  her  own 
body  the  strongest,  best  machine  possible;  and 
I  believe  that  one  of  the  great  lessons  to  be 
taught  to  the  women  of  America  to-day  is  care 
of  themselves.  I  wish  I  could  reach  out,  not 

[89] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

only  to  all  the  girls  in  the  land,  but  to  all  the 
mothers  as  well,  and  could  say  to  them,  'It  is 
your  duty  to  your  family,  to  your  neighbors,  to 
your  Maker,  to  give  yourself  the  strongest  body 
possible.' 

"I  wish  the  mothers  would  hear  this,  and 
could  understand  that  the  work  which  gives  them 
too  little  sleep,  or  allows  them  no  time  for  quiet 
eating  of  their  food,  which  crowds  them  daily 
with  nervous  anxiety  as  to  whether  or  not  the 
work  will  all  be  accomplished,  is  the  work  which 
fills  our  insane  asylums  with  broken-down 
women,  that  makes  our  mothers  unable  to  give 
to  their  daughters  the  love,  the  care  and  atten- 
tion that  girls  need  in  their  growing  years.  A 
great  good  might  be  accomplished  if  it  could 
be  proved  to  women  that  kitchen  utensils 
cost  less  than  coffins,  and  that  money  paid 
for  necessary  help  in  the  household  is  more 
profitable  than  money  paid  to  doctors  and 


nurses." 


No  mother  has  a  right  to  wear  herself  out 
physically  so  that  she  cannot  be  the  central  sun 
of  the  little  system  known  as  the  family.  My 
mother's  cheerfulness  and  courage  and  faith  in 
God  are  my  richest  inheritances,  and  if  I  have 

[90] 


ON  HAPPINESS 

any  faculty  for  happiness  it  is  owing  to  her  won- 
derful example.  The  average  woman  worries 
too  much  and  fails  to  hold  herself  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  peace  which  is  her  rightful  sphere  if 
she  chooses  to  enter  in  and  possess  it.  "The 
art  of  growing  old  gracefully"  is  mastered 
when  a  woman  realizes  what  true  happiness 
is,  and  growing  old  has  no  further  terrors  for 
her. 

There  are  plenty  of  shadows  to  be  seen  if  we 
fix  our  vision  on  them  instead  of  on  the  sunlight 
beyond  and  around  them;  but  why  not  fasten 
our  gaze  on  the  glowing,  life-giving  sunshine 
instead  ?  There  is  sorrow  and  grief  in  the  world 
and  some  of  it  has  come  first  or  last  to  you  and 
me;  but  why  let  it  darken  all  our  days,  when 
Infinite  love  surrounds  us  and  will  give  us  ever- 
lasting peace  if  we  but  claim  it?  Adversity  may 
come,  but  it  cannot  take  away  the  serenity  of  the 
soul.  Let  us  see  to  it  that  we  fortify  ourselves 
with  that  inner  sense  which  constitutes  true  hap- 
piness. 

"The  duty  of  happiness"  is  something  we  owe 
to  our  own  souls  as  much  as  to  those  around  us. 
Let  us  find  that  centre  of  the  whirlpool  of  life 
where  perfect  calm  ever  prevails. 

[91] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

"Let  nothing  make  thee  sad  or  fretful, 
Or  too  regretful, 

Be  still; 

What  God  hath  ordered  must  be  right, 
Then  find  in  it  thine  own  delight, 
My  will. 

"Why  shouldst  thou  fill  to-day  with  sorrow 
About  to-morrow, 

My  heart? 

One  watches  all  with  care  most  true, 
Doubt  not  that  He  will  give  thee,  too, 
Thy  part. 

"Only  be  steadfast;  never  waver; 
Nor  seek  earth's  favor, 

But  rest. 

Thou  knowest  what  God's  will  must  be 
For  all  His  creatures,  so  for  thee 
The  best." 


[92] 


IX 

ON  WORRY 

£  £  ir  N  my  life,"  said  a  woman,  "I  have  wor- 
ried much,  but  never  have  I  worried 
about  the  right  thing  or  the  right  situ- 
ation.   The  thing  to  worry  about  always  turned 
out  something  different  from  what  I  spent  my 
energy  upon.     One  day  this  view  of  the  worry 
question  occurred  forcibly  to  my  mind,  and  the 
ridiculous  waste  of  time  and  strength  appalled 
me.    I  have  never  had  a  worry  since." 

Another  woman  whom  I  know  came  to  a 
realization  of  the  same  truth  a  few  years  ago  in 
much  the  same  way.  She  worried  all  the  time 
about  something — and  there  is  always  a  Some- 
thing to  be  worried  about  if  we  give  way  to  it. 
She  found  one  day  that  this  habit  of  crossing  a 
bridge  before  she  came  to  it — and  perhaps  it 
would  never  be  come  up  to — was  making  her 
old  before  her  time.  She  realized  suddenly  that 

[93] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

she  was  living  at  a  tremendously  high  tension — 
that  she  was  in  a  perpetual  hurry — that  she  could 
no  longer  enjoy  a  good  play  or  a  good  book  or 
a  good  concert  without  a  guilty  look  every  now 
and  then  at  her  watch — that  she  could  not  even 
ride  in  a  horse-car  without  bracing  herself,  as  if 
by  that  she  could  propel  the  thing  and  reach  her 
destination  sooner. 

And  then  she  realized  that  she  was  wasting 
Life — that  she  was  missing  half  of  all  the  daily 
beauty  that  lay  around  her,  and  that  existence 
had  become  for  her  merely  tension.  Just  then 
Annie  Payson  Call's  "Power  Through  Repose" 
fell  into  her  hands,  and  she  decided  to  adopt  a 
new  motto,  "Relax."  She  stopped  worrying, 
teaching  herself  to  remember  that  worrying 
helps  no  cause  and  no  event,  until  she  actually 
comes  up  to  it,  and  then  it  is  too  late.  She  began 
to  look  for  enjoyment  and  beauty  in  the  little 
things  of  life.  She  began  to  relax,  even  on  horse- 
cars.  To-day  she  is  the  embodiment  not  only  of 
calmness,  but  of  courage.  She  has  forgotten 
that  she  ever  had  nerves.  She  is  happy.  She 
relaxed. 

In  that  way  we  can  keep  our  youth  and  defy 
wrinkles.  Doctors  can  tell  you — if  complexion 

[94] 


ON  WORRY 

beautifiers  won't — that  ninety-nine  hundredths 
of  the  wrinkles  and  the  unwelcome  crow's-feet 
on  women's  faces  are  caused  by  Worry.  So  are 
one-half  the  illnesses — wherein  lies  the  power 
of  mental  and  "Christian"  science.  We  can 
imagine  ourselves  into  heaven  if  we  will,  or  we 
can  worry  ourselves  into  that  other  place — un- 
mentionable in  polite  circles — but  we  cannot  re- 
verse that  process.  The  spirit  with  which  we 
accept  life  makes  all  the  difference.  We  can 
take  up  burdens  groaning,  "Oh,  how  shall  I  ever 
bear  you?"  or  laughing,  "Don't  think  you  can 
get  the  better  of  me." 

Most  women  live  in  a  state  of  mental  turmoil 
the  greater  part  of  their  lives.  Self-poise  seems 
to  be  the  rarest  of  virtues  among  women.  We 
allow  ourselves  to  be  continually  stirred  up  over 
trifles,  to  be  annoyed  by  things  not  worth  mind- 
ing. We  allow  petty  criticisms  to  burn  into  our 
very  souls.  A  disparaging  word,  a  thoughtless 
remark,  the  slightest  opposition  to  our  pet 
scheme,  are  allowed  to  disturb  the  unruffled  peace 
that  is  our  birthright,  and  we  either  suffer 
agonies  in  silence  or  we  let  ourselves  down  to  un- 
dignified wrangling. 

Or,  if  we  have  no  immediate  cause  for  trouble 

[95] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

outside  ourselves,  we  worry.  As  Helen  Watter- 
son  Moody  neatly  puts  it:  "Women  are  disposed 
to  take  things  too  seriously  and  to  dissipate  vital 
force  in  that  nervous  debauch  known  as  worry- 
ing." And  she  very  wisely  goes  on  to  say  that 
every  woman  ought  to  be  obliged  by  some  law  to 
spend  an  hour  or  two  a  day  absolutely  alone  and 
unrelaxed,  that  the  whirling  mind  and  quivering 
nerves  might  hush  themselves  with  the  blessed- 
ness of  silence. 

Self-poise  would  be  the  natural  result,  how- 
ever impractical  the  proposition  may  appear. 
Some  women  are  born  with  the  gift  of  self -poise ; 
but  most  of  us  have  to  acquire  it  or,  worse,  get 
along  the  best  or  the  worst  way  we  can  without. 
It  is  never  thrust  upon  us. 

Once  in  a  while  we  come  across  a  woman  who 
is  blessed  with  it;  and  oh,  what  a  comfortable 
creature  she  is — comfortable  and  comforting. 
Trying  situations  and  trying  people  are  as  noth- 
ing to  her.  Some  one  has  likened  this  power 
to  keep  one's  poise  to  an  oil  which  makes  the 
machinery  of  life  run  smoothly.  Better  than 
that,  it  is  an  elevated  plane  that  holds  those  who 
walk  thereon  far  above  the  mire  of  petty  small- 
nesses  of  wrong  living  and  thinking. 

[96] 


ON  WORRY 

There  is  a  man  in  Boston  who  has,  naturally, 
a  quick,  irritable  temper,  but  who  is  noted  for 
his  uniform  gentleness  and  patience  in  dealing 
with  the  hundreds  of  people  with  whom  he  comes 
in  contact  every  day.  In  his  office  hangs  a  pla- 
card with  the  following  inscription,  which  I  rec- 
ommend to  housekeepers,  mothers,  business 
women  and  everybody  else.  It  runs  thus : 

"An  American  poet  has  said: 

1  'It's  easy  enough  to  be  pleasant 

When  life  flows  along  like  a  song; 
But  the  man  worth  while 
Is  the  man  who  will  smile 
When  everything  goes  dead  wrong/ 

"P.  S. — This  applies  to  women  also." 

After  all,  it  is  a  question  of  mind-discipline. 
Let  us  once  realize  that  we  lack  this  power  over 
ourselves  and  determine  to  acquire  it,  and  we 
are  in  a  fair  way  to  be  sweeter  and  better. 

There  might  be  classes  established  for  the 
teaching  of  self-poise  to  all  the  wrangling 
women,  all  the  sensitive  women,  all  the  over- 
ambitious  women,  all  the  selfish  women.  But, 
dear  me !  how  many  of  us  could  say  we  are  be- 

[97] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

yond  the  need  of  joining?  And,  besides,  there 
are  no  Marcus  Aureliuses  in  the  teachers'  bu- 
reaus, just  now,  either. 

We  are  placed  in  the  scheme  of  life  just  where 
we  were  meant  to  be.  Now,  then,  let  us  live 
it  out.  What  is  meant  for  us  to  do,  let  us  do; 
but  let  us  not  worry  over  what  is  not  meant  for 
us.  It  depends  on  us  whether  we  take  this  for 
a  world  of  honest,  cheerful  work,  or  a  world  of 
hard  labor.  It  is  all  character-building.  Ever 
think  of  that?  All  character-building. 

All  the  world  needs  of  us,  all  God  asks  of  us, 
is  that  we  live  out  our  own  lives  truly,  faithfully, 
earnestly  and  the  best  we  possibly  can.  It  is 
for  us  to  find  out  how — not  sit  down  or  hamper 
our  work  with  worrying  about  the  how. 

There  are  two  ways  of  walking  through  the 
world — plodding  dejectedly  along  with  our  eyes 
on  the  muddy  road,  seeing  only  the  obstacles  in 
our  way  and  feeling  only  the  burdens  on  our 
backs;  or  holding  our  heads  high,  seeing  the 
beautiful  broad  sky  above,  smelling  the  scent  of 
flowers,  tasting  the  delights  of  living  and  feeling 
the  love  of  God.  Which  shall  we  choose  ? 

A  pleasant  face  carries  joy  and  sheds  sunshine. 
A  worried,  harassed  countenance  may  make  a 

[98] 


ON  WORRY 

whole  roomful  miserable.  Every  happy  thought 
lends  a  pleasant  line  to  the  face,  and  there  is  no 
excuse  for  looking  otherwise.  All  girls  are  more 
or  less  pretty  at  twenty ;  but  it  has  been  her  own 
fault  if  the  woman  of  fifty  has  not  the  best  kind 
of  beauty — that  indefinable  sweetness  of  gra- 
ciousness  that  reflects  itself  in  every  feature  of 
the  face.  Happiness  is  ours  if  we  will  but  reach 
out  for  our  small  share  and  make  the  most  of  it. 
But  if  we  reject  it,  saying,  "What  have  we  in 
common  with  thee?"  we  deserve  to  be  miserable, 
and  we  are.  More  than  that,  we  are  disagree- 
able to  other  people;  and  in  this  world  that  is  a 
thing  we  ought  to  consider. 

Nothing  that  other  people  say  or  do  can  affect 
us  much  unless  we  let  it,  and  it  is  much  easier 
not  to  be  troubled  by  outside  worries — and  all 
worries  are  outside  our  true  lives — than  to  nurse 
trouble. 

Did  you  ever  try  to  help  a  person  who  will  not 
be  helped?  To  shed  sunshine  into  a  soul  that 
will  not  empty  itself  or  be  emptied  of  shadows  ? 
Is  there  anything  more  discouraging?  But  after 
all,  the  best  thing  we  can  do  for  our  friends  is 
to  be  good  and  fine  and  true.  Nothing  tells  like 
living.  "The  kingdom  of  heaven"  is  within. 

[99] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

When  we  truly  desire  the  best,  we  lose  the  cer- 
tainty that  it  is  revealed  only  to  us  and  to  those 
who  agree  with  us. 

God  opens  a  great  fountain  of  truth,  that 
shows  itself  in  many  springs;  we  hold  our  cups 
for  its  waters  of  life,  and  our  cups  are  of  many 
shapes,  molded  by  our  own  hands  and  decorated 
with  our  own  thoughts;  but  they  all  hold  living 
water,  and  the  shape  or  pattern  of  the  cup  signi- 
fies nothing.  If  we  keep  this  thought  in  mind, 
we  shall  not  be  overmuch  disturbed  that  we  can- 
not rule  our  world.  As  time  goes  on  we  change 
our  cups ;  we  learn  to  make  them  of  larger  mold 
and  of  more  beautiful  pattern,  but  however  much 
we  may  draw  from  the  fountain,  its  flow  does  not 
diminish,  and  no  one  is  denied  the  water  of  life. 

It  is  of  no  importance  whether  you  or  I  see 
first  the  vision  for  which  the  world  waits.  The 
important  thing  is  that  we  do  not  insist  that 
others  shall  see  it  before  their  time.  Emerson 
says:  "God  screens  us  evermore  from  prema- 
ture ideas.  Our  eyes  are  holden,  that  we  cannot 
see  things  that  stare  us  in  the  face  until  the  hour 
arrives  when  the  mind  is  ripened ;  then  we  behold 
them,  and  the  time  that  we  saw  them  not  is  like 
a  dream."  We  wait  for  the  child.  We  are 
[100] 


ON  WORRY 

tenderly  patient  while  he  stumbles  in  learning  to 
walk,  patient  also  when  we  find  that  he  must 
develop  his  character  by  his  own  experiences, 
and  not  by  ours.  Let  us  be  patient  with  each 
other  and  with  the  world. 

Nobody  can  make  us  happy.  It  all  depends 
upon  ourselves;  and  by  the  same  token  nobody 
can  make  us  unhappy.  What  will  you  take  from 
life's  menu?  a  strengthening  feast  of  joy  and 
sweetness,  or  the  blighting,  unsatisfying  fare  of 
bitterness  and  discouragement?  It's  just  for  you 
to  choose.  And  always  remember  that  your  song 
may  cheer  some  one  behind  you  whose  courage 
is  sinking  low. 

"Dear  restless  heart,  be  still,  for  peace  is  God's 

own  smile, 

His  love  can  every  wrong  and  sorrow  reconcile  ; 
Just  love  and  love  and  love  and  calmly  wait 

awhile. 

"Dear  restless  heart,  be  still;  don't  fret  and 

worry  so ; 
God  hath  a  thousand  ways  His  love  and  help  to 

show; 
Just  trust  and  trust  and  trust  until  His  will  you 

know." 

[101] 


ON  SOLITUDE 

IT  is  the  custom  to  cry  out  against  the  lack 
of  originality  in  woman;  and  it  is  quite 
true  that  those  who  have  achieved  it  have 
first  known  the  blessedness  of  solitude.  It  is 
the  only  way.  It  is  difficult  for  the  average 
woman  to  realize  it,  but  she  either  takes  too 
much  from  or  gives  too  much  to  her  friends. 
But  the  best  and  truest  friendships  are  perhaps 
those  which  cannot  stand  the  crucial  test  of  a 
perpetual  companionship.  Just  because  one  hap- 
pens to  know  the  power  of  giving  out  much,  of 
feeling  intensely,  of  being  for  the  time  so  very 
much  to  those  for  whom  she  cares — precisely  for 
this  reason  will  she  need  at  times  to  draw  into 
herself,  to  go  away,  to  be  alone,  to  rest. 

Especially  is  this  true  if  those  friends  have 
the  sympathetic  temperament  which  takes   its 
color  partly  from  its  surroundings.    Your  happi- 
[102] 


ON   SOLITUDE 

ness,  then,  becomes  partly  theirs;  they  share  in 
your  anxiety,  your  sorrow,  your  depression — in 
everything,  in  fact,  that  belongs  to  you.  In  like 
manner  they  compel  you  to  feel  with  them ;  and 
the  result,  perhaps,  hardly  recognized  at  the 
time,  is  to  make  you  aware  that  you  have  been 
interested  most  intensely,  that  you  have  given 
out  without  intending  it,  something  almost  too 
intimate  and  too  much  your  own  to  be  so  given. 

Some  of  the  bitterest  lessons  in  life  are  learned 
through  such  intimacies.  Sometimes  we  refuse 
to  recognize  those  friends  who  take  all  and  give 
nothing,  until  they  have  absorbed  everything 
and  we  are  left  like  a  dry  sponge  to  realize  their 
unfaithfulness.  But  it  is  through  such  lessons 
that  we  come  to  know  the  chaff  from  the  wheat 
and  to  realize  the  need  of  an  inner  strength 
which  shall  enable  us  to  stand  upon  our  own 
feet.  Hence  it  is  that  even  friends  who  know 
each  other  through  and  through,  and  who  are 
congenial  down  to  the  very  lightest  mood,  ought 
still  to  shun  a  life  that  will  bring  them  into  too 
close  relationship  and  prevent  their  individual 
development. 

Women  have  been  slow  to  realize  this.  For 
generations  women  have  been  sheltered,  pro- 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

tected  and  cared  for  until  they  have  been  con- 
tented to  dwell  in  a  state  of  contented  babyhood. 
Think  for  an  instant  of  a  boy,  surrounded  from 
infancy  with  the  influences  that  have  enveloped 
girlhood.  Keep  him  done  up  in  cotton  wool 
throughout  childhood  and  youth,  taught  never  to 
raise  his  voice  for  fear  of  being  "unladylike, " 
never  to  assert  his  rights,  never  to  be  himself 
and  to  accept  without  question  the  decision  and 
opinions  of  others  on  all  topics  outside  the 
nursery.  Repeat  this  experience  with  successive 
generations  of  boys,  and  where  would  your  "su- 
periority of  man"  be? 

On  the  other  hand,  let  your  girls  out  into  the 
sunlight  and  air,  teach  them  the  free  use  of 
muscles  and  mind,  and  reprove  them  not  if,  in 
the  beginning,  they  are  crude,  and  women  will 
cease  to  be  the  complacent  and  gregarious  beings 
they  have  been;  they  will  cease  to  worship  the 
fetish  of  Who  is  Who  and  What  is  What;  they 
will  cease  to  fear  the  awful  and  unblinking  eye 
of  Society  and  be  ready  to  seek  and  find  them- 
selves. 

Women  are  needed  in  all  good  work  more  to- 
day than  ever  before.  Let  us  remember,  then, 
the  more  we  are  in  ourselves  the  more  we  can 
[104] 


ON  SOLITUDE 

do  for  others.  There  is  nothing  greater  in  life, 
nothing  greater  in  Christianity  than  this  great 
principle  of  service  and  love  for  others.  Kindli- 
ness, helpfulness,  service;  these  three  were  never 
more  needed  than  now.  The  great-hearted,  sym- 
pathetic, charitable,  brave,  intelligent  woman  is 
needed  everywhere,  in  the  home  as  much,  yes, 
more  than  in  public  service.  It  is  hers  to  enlarge 
her  own  horizons  and  to  lose  her  pettiness  by 
loyal,  intelligent  service.  The  narrow,  self-cen- 
tered mother  cannot  do  for  her  family  what  the 
mother  does  who  possesses  a  trained  and  logical 
mind.  It  is  not  only  the  value  of  the  moral  judg- 
ment which  suffers  from  a  lack  of  privacy  and 
individual  freedom ;  it  is  the  quality  of  the  femi- 
nine mind  itself  which  degenerates  by  over- 
crowding. 

The  hearthstone  is  no  less  sacred  because  intel- 
ligence reigns  there;  the  touch  of  woman's  hand 
is  no  less  tender  because  she  studies  Shakespeare 
and  proposes  measures  for  the  beautifying  of  her 
town  and  the  alleviation  of  the  sufferings  of  its 
people;  the  press  of  baby  fingers  upon  the 
mother's  brow  will  ever  be  dearer  than  the 
plaudits  of  the  multitude. 

But  we  should  not  forget  that  we  need  to  have 

[105] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

our  horizons  broadened.  We  need  to  accustom 
ourselves  to  larger  views  of  life  and  of  work. 
So  long  as  our  lives  are  bounded  by  our  towns, 
or  even  our  own  States — so  long  are  we  neglect- 
ing our  opportunities.  Naturally,  we  are  most 
interested  in  the  things  around  us,  and  our  own 
particular  kind  of  work  seems  to  us  the  greatest 
thing  of  the  kind.  But  if  we  shut  ourselves  up 
in  that,  we  cannot  grow.  We  must  be  interested 
to  know  what  others  are  doing,  and  if  they  are 
getting  more  out  of  life,  or,  more  important  yet, 
putting  more  into  life,  than  we. 

We  cannot  do  this  by  confining  our  interests 
and  sympathies  to  the  territory  which  is  actually 
bounded  by  the  geographical  horizon  that  sur- 
rounds our  home.  We  may  not  be  able  to 
actually  do  much  for  ours,  but  there  is  no  limit 
to  what  we  may  be  interested  in.  And  the  larger 
our  interests  the  larger  are  we.  It  is  impossible 
for  us  to  accustom  ourselves  to  large  views 
of  life  and  broad  sympathies  for  the  world's 
charities  and  remain  narrow  and  petty  our- 
selves. 

Of  course,  it  was  a  little  Boston  girl,  sitting 
at  the  family  dinner  table  while  her  father  and 
his  friends  carried  on  a  serious  discussion  as  to 
[106] 


ON   SOLITUDE 

the  child  of  nowadays.  They  were  lamenting 
the  fact  that  the  children  to-day  seem  so  blase, 
so  little  affected  by  things  grave  or  gay.  "Why," 
said  the  father,  umy  children  read  without  a 
tear,  books  that  used  to  make  me  weep!  It 
seems  as  if  all  emotion  has  gone  out  of  them." 
Whereupon  our  little  friend  looked  up  and  re- 
marked, with  overpowering  dignity,  "Oh,  papa, 
it  is  not  that  emotion  has  gone  out,  but  self-con- 
trol has  come  in."  Wasn't  the  child  right? 
This  is  an  age  of  self-control.  It  is  supposed  to 
be  the  correct  thing  to  hide  our  emotions,  and, 
like  most  correct  things,  it  is  often  carried  too 
far.  How  often  we  hear  people  wax  eloquent, 
even  to  tears,  over  the  help  they  have  received 
from  some  friend  who  is  no  longer  with  them 
on  earth — some  quiet,  unseen  personality,  whose 
power  over  their  lives  they  now  fully  realize. 
Are  we  not  sometimes  tempted  to  wonder,  in 
listening  to  such  tributes,  how  often  in  their 
lifetime  they  received  such  devotion,  such 
recognition  ?  Do  we  not  catch  ourselves  hoping 
that  they  used  sometimes  to  put  their  arms  about 
their  mother  and  say,  "What  a  good  mother  you 
are  to  me !"  But  how  sadly  true  it  is  that  the 
glowing  tribute,  the  costly  monument,  the  piled- 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

up  roses,  are  often  attempts  to  atone  for  lost 
opportunities. 

He  was  a  wise  man  who  said,  "Give  me  a 
little  taffy  now  rather  than  a  lot  of  epitaphy 
later  on."  Not  "taffy,"  but  honest  appreciation 
is  due  the  woman  who  goes  patiently  day  after 
day  about  her  business,  not  worrying  about  the 
future,  not  getting  easily  discouraged,  and 
knowing  just  how  to  conserve  herself  for  their 
best  interests. 

We  might  all  be  helped  by  adopting  the  fol- 
lowing, which  was  put  forth  some  years  ago  as  a 
"Business  Man's  New  Year  Endeavor,"  al- 
though I  cannot  see  why  it  will  not  do  for  an 
every-day  endeavor  for  every  woman : 

"To  be  joyous  in  my  work,  moderate  in  my 
pleasures,  chary  in  my  confidences,  faithful  in 
my  friendships ;  to  be  energetic  but  not  excitable, 
enthusiastic  but  not  fanatical ;  loyal  to  the  truth, 
as  I  see  it,  but  ever  open-minded  to  the  newer 
light;  to  abhor  gush  as  I  would  profanity,  and 
hate  cant  as  I  would  a  lie;  to  be  careful  in  my 
promises,  punctual  in  my  engagements,  candid 
with  myself  and  frank  with  others;  to  discour- 
age shams  and  rejoice  in  all  that  is  beautiful  and 
true;  to  do  my  work  and  live  my  life  so  that 
[108] 


ON   SOLITUDE 

neither  shall  require  defence  or  apology;  to 
honor  no  one  simply  because  rich  or  famous,  and 
despise  no  one  because  humble  or  poor;  to  be 
gentle  and  considerate  toward  the  weak ;  respect- 
ful yet  self-respecting  toward  the  great,  cour- 
teous to  all,  obsequious  to  none ;  to  seek  wisdom 
from  great  books  and  inspiration  from  good 
men ;  to  invigorate  my  mind  with  noble  thoughts, 
as  I  do  my  body  with  sunshine  and  fresh  air;  to 
prize  all  sweet  human  friendships  and  seek  to 
make  at  least  one  home  happy;  to  have  charity 
for  the  erring,  sympathy  for  the  sorrowing, 
cheer  for  the  despondent;  to  leave  the  world  a 
little  better  off  because  of  me;  and  to  leave  it, 
when  I  must,  bravely  and  cheerfully,  with  faith 
in  God  and  good  will  to  all  my  f ellowmen ;  this 
shall  be  my  endeavor  during  the  coming  year." 

When  a  woman  learns  to  turn  her  back  upon 
the  common,  the  regular,  the  accepted,  and  prove 
for  herself  the  blessedness  of  solitude,  she  learns 
to  find  her  mental  balance. 

"The  love  or  hatred  of  solitude,"  says  Scho- 
penhauer, "does  not  depend  on  the  good  or  evil 
disposition  of  the  heart,  but  on  the  natural 
wealth  or  poverty  of  the  mind."  Let  us  go  far- 
ther and  say  it  depends  also  upon  the  amount  of 
[109] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

mental  discipline  and  the  habit  of  standing  upon 
one's  own  intellectual  feet.  We  need  to  love  the 
silence  of  the  stars  and  the  blackness  of  mid- 
night. We  need  the  courage  to  face  ourselves 
in  the  blessedness  of  solitude.  What  the  crowd 
gives  is  only  an  average,  a  commonplace  good- 
ness; let  us  be  strong  enough  to  seek  acquain- 
tanceship with  the  highest  by  the  only  legitimate 
path,  which  is  marked  "Solitude,"  and  be  thank- 
ful if  it  be  not  hedged  about  by  thorns  and  thick 
darkness. 

To  th€t  woman  who  would  be  individual,  who 
wants  to  be  an  inspiration  and  a  beneficence., 
there  is  but  one  message :  Be  not  afraid  of  Your-"* 
self;  get  acquainted  with,  the  deeps  of  your  own 
nature;  face  the  ''shortcomings  of  your*  own 
spirit.  Go  into  the  open  country  alone  if  you 
can ;  if  not,  take  a  little  time  out  of  every  twenty- 
four  hours  to  think.  Just  as  the  observance  of 
the  Sabbath  is  a  wise  thing  from  a  physiological 
standpoint,  so  are  self-communion  and  its  breath- 
ing spaces  a  blessing  to  the  individual. 

As  I  have  said  before  and  say  often,  it  rests 

with  the  woman  herself  whether  she  will  be  like 

a  rose  tree,  full  of  brightness  and  fragrance,  a 

help,  a  comfort  and  an  inspiration;  or  whether 

[no] 


ON  SOLITUDE 

she  will  degenerate  into  a  mere  replica  of  other 
women  who  wear  good  clothes,  do  and  say  the 
conventional,  commonplace  thing  and  are  as  un- 
interesting as  a  sunset  without  a  flush  of  color. 
Are  we  "building  ourselves  fairy  palaces  proof 
against  all  adversity?"  Are  we  learning  the 
continuous  habit  of  serious  consecutive  thought 
and  clearing  our  minds  from  the  loose-fibred 
accumulations  of  generations  ? 

If  girls  could  be  left  to  themselves  as  boys 
are,  and  allowed  to  know  from  childhood  the 
blessed  privilege  of  unconscious  self-companion- 
ship, and  the  solitary  communion  of  earth  and 
air  and  sky,  would  not  the  other  side  of  their 
natures  be  developed?  Would  not  they  learn 
to  form  their  own  opinions,  and  hold  inde- 
pendent ideas,  just  as  naturally  as  boys?  To 
those  occasional  seasons  when  a  woman  seems 
to  have  lost  her  hold  on  life  is  owing  some  of 
the  most  helpful  work  ever  given  to  the  world. 
Take  the  case  of  Helen  Hunt.  What  poet  has 
ever  given  us  more  real  heart-lifting  words,  more 
soulful  encouragement  and  inspiration  than  she  ? 
And  yet,  not  until  after  grief  and  bereavement 
had  swept  in  a  perfect  storm  over  her  life  and 
left  her  prostrate,  not  till  after  she  had  for 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

months  blankly  faced  the  problem  of  a  seemingly 
blasted  life,  did  she  begin  to  realize  the  object 
of  her  existence — the  message  of  help  for  the 
world  which  must  come  through  bitter  pain  and 
trial.  Not  until  after  she  knew  the  blessedness 
of  solitude,  and  had  wrestled  alone  with  her 
angel  of  renunciation  did  she  see  the  lesson  of 
life  and  experience  the  strength  that  comes  after 
drinking  the  cup  of  disenchantment. 

There  is  no  such  thing  as  standing  face  to 
face  with  our  inmost  selves,  of  divesting  our- 
selves of  all  pretense  and  sham  while  in  the  com- 
pany of  others,  even  the  most  intimate  friend. 
"We  do  not  speak  our  deepest  feelings — our 
inmost  thoughts  have  no  revealings."  A  certain 
sensitiveness  debars  us,  even  when  we  would  do 
so,  from  showing  either  our  best  or  our  worst 
qualities.  We  even  keep  them  veiled  from  our- 
selves, except  when  some  exigency  of  sorrow  or 
surprise  reveals  them  momentarily,  or  we  face 
ourselves  alone  in  the  blackness  of  night.  It  is 
then  that  real  thought  begins,  that  independence 
of  intellect  is  generated,  that  the  power  of  con- 
centrated, serious  mentality  begins.  A  promi- 
nent woman  writer,  in  ah  account  of  her  travels 
in  Scotland,  tells  of  a  half-hour  in  which  she 

[112] 


ON  SOLITUDE 

was  left  behind  in  a  rough  climb,  by  her  com- 
panions. uTo  see  the  falls  was  of  small  ac- 
count," says  she.  "But  just  once  in  a  lifetime 
to  have  a  few  blessed  moments  all  to  one's  self 
in  those  sweet,  wild  Highland  solitudes,  would 
not  that  be  worth  the  having?"  That  half-hour 
was  worth  more  than  a  whole  week  of  castle- 
seeing  in  company  with  a  crowd  of  tourists.  A 
good  digestion  is  as  necessary  to  a  hearty  dinner 
as  the  viands  composing  it.  And  there  are  plenty 
of  thoughtful  women  who  can  say  with  truth, 
"I  should  die  if  I  could  not  sometimes  be  alone." 
We  may  love  our  friends  never  so  well,  but 
there  are  times  when  we  must  face  ourselves  and 
"take  account  of  stock"  intellectually  and 
morally. 

There  is  a  delight  beyond  expression  in  the 
realization  of  mental  and  spiritual  individuality. 
To  know  and  to  feel  that  one  is  an  independent, 
thinking  being  with  the  divine  right  to  judge  for 
herself,  and  the  capability  for  sustained  mental 
work,  is  an  inheritance  which  woman  is  now 
coming  into  with  deep  and  holy  joy. 

The  world  needs  strong  women  more  than 
ever  before ;  it  needs  them  as  the  established  rule, 
not  as  the  exception.  What  have  you  and  I  to 

[113] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

do  about  it?  Let  us  have  less  "gabble"  and 
more  real  gain;  less  noise  and  flurry  and  more 
of  the  benefits  of  heart-stillness. 

Be  still;  the  crown  of  life  is  silentness. 

Give  thou  a  quiet  hour  to  each  long  day. 
Too  much  of  time  we  spend  in  profitless 

And  foolish  talk — too  little  do  we  say. 

If  thou  wouldst  gather  words  that  shall  avail, 
Learning  a  wisdom  worthy  to  express, 

Leave  for  a  while  thy  chat  and  empty  tale — 
Study  the  golden  speech  of  silentness. 


XI 


ON  WOMEN'S  CLUBS 

IT  has  been  the  fashion,  and  is  still  with  a 
certain  class  of  people,  to  disparage  the 
woman's  club.  They  say  the  club  is  a 
place  where  gossip  and  backbiting  flourish,  and 
the  virtues  of  love  and  charity  and  tolerance  are 
chiefly  conspicuous  by  their  absence.  I  have  even 
known  a  brilliant  lecturer,  who  depends  for  her 
audiences  on  these  same  women's  clubs,  to  refuse 
to  lend  a  hand  in  any  active  work,  saying  she 
"did  not  believe  in  women's  clubs,  because  the 
members  are  selfish,  self-seeking  and  trivial ;  be- 
cause the  club  women  are  all  envious  and  un- 
charitable." 

Now,  isn't  this  sweeping  accusation  rather  un- 
just? When  we  look  about  and  see  what  women 
have  accomplished  for  their  own  sex  since  the 
clubs  were  established;  when  we  look  about  and 
see  what  the  clubs  are  really  doing  to-day  for 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

their  communities;  when  we  count  up  the  libra- 
ries, the  improved  sanitary  conditions  of  towns 
and  cities,  the  increased  educational  advantages ; 
when  we  realize  the  increased  average  intelli- 
gence of  the  average  woman  who  belongs  to 
current  events  classes  and  literary  clubs;  when, 
in  short,  we  note  the  broadening  of  character  in 
the  average  individual  club  woman,  is  this  a  fair 
statement  ? 

To  be  sure,  there  are  narrow-minded,  envious 
women  in  clubs.  Alas !  we  all  know  them.  One 
such  woman  is  enough  to  injure  seriously  the 
work  of  a  small  club;  half  a  dozen  of  her  can 
give  a  large  club  a  bad  name — a  reputation  for 
backbiting  and  all  uncharitableness.  Half  a 
dozen  such  women  can  keep  a  club  in  a  chronic 
quarrelsome  state,  and  by  spreading  evil  reports 
outside  can  destroy  all  its  usefulness  in  a  com- 
munity. But  in  the  most  notorious  of  such  affairs 
the  trouble  is  caused  by  a  mere  handful  of  nar- 
row-minded women,  while  nine-tenths  of  the 
membership  sit  sadly  by  in  shamed  silence.  Shall 
they  be  condemned  because  of  the  quarrelsome 
few? 

But  in  the  vast  majority  of  clubs  the  spirit  of 
petty  rivalry  and  self-seeking  which  is  sometimes 
[116] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

noticeable  in  individual  cases  is  fast  disappear- 
ing, or  has  never  materialized.  There  is  such 
a  great  and  splendid  work  for  the  women's  clubs 
to  do  that  the  earnest,  noble,  unselfish  woman 
becomes  absorbed  in  something  beyond  self-seek- 
ing. She  ceases  to  care  whether  her  name  stands 
first  on  the  list  of  committees,  or,  indeed,, 
whether  it  is  there  at  all.  She  ceases  to  mind  if 
she  is  left  off  the  list  of  after-dinner  speakers  at 
the  annual  banquet.  She  ceases  to  suffer  an 
envious  pang  because  her  enemy  is  asked  to  write 
the  club  poem,  for  the  simple  reason  that  she 
has  ceased  to  be  conscious  of  an  enemy. 

She  has  ceased  to  feel  the  slights  which  may 
have  grieved  her  in  the  past,  because  she  has 
ceased  to  "wear  a  chip  on  her  shoulder."  She 
has  come  to  rejoice  and  be  glad  in  any  good 
thing  that  may  befall  any  good  woman  because 
she  has  grown  broad-minded  enough  to  recog- 
nize that  honor  and  glory  falling  to  one  woman 
mean  honor  and  glory  for  the  cause  of  all 
women;  that  in  these  days  the  advancement  of 
woman  and  the  glory  of  womanhood  comes  to 
all  and  for  all  and  through  all  of  us.  For  such 
is  the  real  sisterhood  of  woman.  The  club  move- 
ment was  never  more  serious,  perhaps  never  so 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

earnest  as  it  is  today.  It  may  be  because  women 
are  finding  how  much  better  it  is  to  do  than  to 
talk,  to  be  than  to  vainly  imagine.  As  one  bright 
woman  said:  "It  doesn't  always  mean  that  a 
woman  is  growing  because  she  talks  a  great 
deal." 

The  ordinary  club  woman  who  is  a  busy  wife 
and  mother  seeks  her  club  as  a  rest  and  a  change 
from  the  activities  of  home;  the  friendships  she 
forms  there  make  an  added  interest  to  her  life 
and  help  to  get  her  out  of  the  treadmill  of  her 
daily  existence.  The  ordinary  wife  and  mother 
has  plenty  to  do  in  her  own  family,  to  be  sure, 
but  she  can  do  that  plenty  ten  times  as  well  for 
the  change  that  is  afforded  by  an  hour  or  two  at 
the  club  each  week;  for  there  she  is  transported 
to  a  different  environment,  sees  through  another 
pair  of  eyes  and  comes  in  contact  with  another 
set  of  minds.  She  goes  home  rested,  refreshed 
and  stimulated  through  her  club  friendships. 
She  has  not  belittled  herself  with  club  gossip, 
but  she  has  enlarged  her  sympathies  and  taken  a 
fresh  outlook  on  life. 

If  this  is  true  of  the  woman  who  has  her 
days  crowded  full  with  home  ties  and  home  in- 
terests, how  much  more  is  it  true  of  the  woman 
[118] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

who  has  no  home  ties;  and  unfortunately  we 
have  hundreds,  yes,  thousands  of  such  women  in 
this  country.  In  the  club  memberships  there  are 
not  only  many  unmarried  women,  but  there  are 
widows  who  have  been  bereft  of  their  families, 
and  a  goodly  proportion  of  comfortable  matrons 
whose  children  have  grown  up  and  left  home, 
either  to  establish  nests  of  their  own  or  to  go  into 
business  for  themselves.  The  club  has  been  the 
salvation  of  all  these  women  and  has  prevented 
their  growing  old  before  their  time.  "There  are 
no  old  women  nowadays,"  says  some  one,  and 
it  is  largely  because  we  have  women's  clubs, 
where  women  keep  young  without  thinking 
about  it. 

There  is  nothing  that  develops  a  woman 
better,  or  that  broadens  her  character  more  than 
a  club  life.  Give  her  something  to  think  about, 
something  to  take  away  with  her  when  she  comes 
into  the  club ;  she  will  soon  be  willing  to  do  her 
share  of  the  work,  and  then  she  will  begin  to 
grow.  Many  a  fine  president  of  to-day  can  recall 
the  time  when  she  was  afraid  of  her  own  voice, 
when  she  accepted  her  first  bit  of  committee 
work  with  fear  and  trembling.  And  she  knows 
that  the  years  between  have  been  years  of  growth 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

and  helpfulness  and  work  for  others.  For,  after 
all,  that  is  the  true  secret  of  the  good  club 
woman — helpfulness  to  others.  She  who  goes 
on  to  committees  and  works  her  way  through  the 
lower  offices  and  up  to  the  president's  chair 
simply  from  personal  ambition  and  self-seeking 
pride,  is  not  the  good  club  woman,  nor  the  really 
successful  one.  For  in  these  modern  days  per- 
sonal ambition  is  more  plainly  discerned  than  it 
used  to  be,  and  the  woman  who  climbs  into  the 
presidential  chair  merely  for  personal  glorifica- 
tion is  not  destined  to  sit  there  long. 

There  must  be  a  higher,  a  more  altruistic  pur- 
pose. The  best  president  is  she  who  is  so  full  of 
plans  for  the  elevation  of  the  club  and  the  devel- 
opment of  every  member  that  she  forgets  her- 
self. And  so  she  becomes  at  once  the  servant 
and  the  queen  of  clubs.  In  short,  the  club  move- 
ment is  to-day  one  of  the  greatest  factors  in  the 
world's  progress;  and  he  or  she  who  proclaims 
a  disbelief  in  it  because  of  the  shortcomings  of 
some  few  club  acquaintances  lacks  the  faculty  of 
a  comprehensive  perception  of  the  things  of  to- 
day as  well  as  of  prophetic  insight  into  the 
future. 

But  when  your  club  begins  to  be  a  bore,  it  is 
[120] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

time  to  leave  it.  It  is  a  mistake  to  hold  that  by 
staying  in  it  with  a  sense  of  resignation  you  are 
discharging  any  sort  of  a  duty  to  yourself  or 
anybody.  The  fault  is  either  with  you  or  the 
club,  of  course.  If  it  is  the  former,  you  can  drop 
your  connection  with  it  without  formality,  with 
the  understanding  with  yourself  that  it  is  to  be 
taken  up  again  after  a  little;  if  it  is  the  latter, 
you  would  do  better  to  go  to  work  so  to  change 
the  aspect  of  the  club  that  it  will  hold  all  of  its 
old  interest  for  you.  But  if  you  do  take  a  vaca- 
tion in  this  fashion  yourself,  you  need  not  be 
afraid  of  losing  interest  altogether.  The  certain 
result  will  be  only  a  feeling  of  being  outside 
everything  and  alien  in  interest  to  that  of  your 
friends,  and  the  end  so  brought  about  will  be 
the  one  you  want.  You  will  go  back  to  your  club 
with  a  new  appreciation  and  be  of  new  service  to 
it.  When  a  club  gets  to  be  an  unpleasant  duty 
its  best  function  is  missing.  The  self-seeking, 
ambitious  woman,  the  woman  who  uses  the  club 
merely  as  a  pedestal  on  which  to  pose  before  an 
admiring  world,  or  as  a  stepping-stone  to  get 
into  a  higher  grade  of  society  than  she  has  pre- 
viously known,  having  only  her  own  selfish  aims 
at  heart,  has  only  a  short-lived  success,  and  ap- 

[121] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

pears  with  less  frequency  every  season.  The 
club  does  not  want  and  will  not  keep  such  women 
as  leaders.  To-day  the  club  leader  must  have 
a  higher  aim  and  a  broader  culture,  and,  added 
unto  these,  a  genuine  desire  to  help  humanity 
to  better  things  than  the  superficial  woman  who 
"must  stand  in  the  full  glare  of  the  footlights  at 
any  cost." 

More  than  that,  the  woman  who  sees  in  the 
club  movement  of  to-day  nothing  beyond  that 
very  primitive  stage  when  women  wrote  papers 
from  encyclopediac  notes,  or  when  they  begged 
or  hired  some  other  person  to  write  them,  has 
not  passed  the  a  b  c  class  of  the  women's  clubs. 
It  is  a  beautiful  idea,  isn't  it?  that  to-day  women 
are  reaching  hands  across  mountains  and  plains 
and  establishing  hearty,  whole-souled  friendships 
in  every  part  of  this  great  country.  What  would 
our  grandmothers  have  said  at  the  very  idea  of 
corresponding  freely  and  intimately  with  women 
of  whose  ancestors  they  knew  nothing  and  whose 
names,  even,  they  had  not  heard  a  few  months 
before?  It  is  one  of  the  beauties  of  the  club 
movement  of  to-day,  that  we  are  opening  our 
hearts  to  each  other  in  this  way:  that  our  ideas 
of  helpfulness  make  us  forget  the  old  conven- 
[122] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

tionalities  and  that  the  broader  outlook  which 
belongs  to  the  woman  of  to-day  is  contagious. 
For  it  is  impossible  to  get  drawn  into  this  larger 
view  of  club  life  and  remain  contented  with  a 
narrow  horizon.  We  are  bound  to  grow  and  to 
throw  off  the  shackles  of  prejudice  and  pettiness. 
We  cannot  help  it. 

Of  course,  there  are  certain  dangers  connected 
with  club  life.  Our  activities  multiply  and  we 
are  in  danger  of  being  drawn  into  a  vortex  that 
will  threaten  to  swallow  us.  When  the  club 
season  begins  some  of  us  will  venture  into  the 
outer  edge  of  a  whirlpool  that,  unless  we  can 
manage  to  hold  ourselves  steady  and  keep  our 
mental  poise,  will  suck  us  under,  and  we  shall  go 
on  and  on  in  the  concentric  circles  until  we  are 
wrecked,  nerves  and  mind.  There  is  little  doubt 
that  overwork  in  so-called  "club-duty"  has  re- 
duced more  than  one  woman  to  nervous  prostra- 
tion. This  is  a  gloomy  view  of  the  case,  I  know, 
and  I  shall  be  blamed  for  giving  utterance  to  it; 
but  is  it  not  the  truth?  Are  we  not  too  apt  to 
take  ourselves  too  seriously?  If  we  are  indi- 
vidually of  "greater  value  than  many  sparrows," 
are  we  not  individually  of  greater  value,  to  our- 
selves and  our  families  at  least,  than  many  clubs  ? 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

Not  but  what  the  club  stands  for  a  serious  part 
of  our  life-work;  not  but  what  we  should  be  will- 
ing to  bring  to  it  the  best  of  ourselves  and  most 
earnest  labors  and  affection.  But  what  I  depre- 
cate is  the  mistaken  view  of  club  work  which  we 
are  in  imminent  danger  of  taking.  When  we 
allow  ourselves  to  be  drawn  into  the  whirling 
vortex  made  up  of  club  classes,  too  many  clubs 
with  the  varying  interests,  too  great  a  multi- 
plicity of  club  committees,  receptions  and  club 
teas  by  the  score,  until  the  very  name  of  them 
nauseates  us,  the  scramble  for  office  (either  for 
ourselves  or  our  friends)  and  the  numerous  petty 
trials  and  tribulations  that  follow  in  the  wake 
of  all  these  things;  then  we  are  not  getting  the 
best  results  from  club  work  ourselves,  nor  giving 
them  to  others,  either.  "There  is  but  one  way  to 
become  a  perfect,  all-round  club  woman,  and 
that  is  by  being  a  perfect  all-round  woman." 
And  the  first  essential  for  that  is,  to  find  and 
keep  our  mental  poise — to  make  ourselves  some- 
thing more  than  a  social  chatterbox  or  a  bundle 
of  nerves. 

Those  writers  who  are  fond  of  descanting  on 
the  injury  to  the  home  that  attends  club  mem- 
bership seldom  understand  their  subject.  As  one 


ON  WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

woman,  responding  to  a  toast  on  "The  Club 
Husband,"  puts  it: 

"The  unwritten  law  of  the  ideal  women's  club 
is:  This  club  exists  for  the  happiness  of  the 
whole  family.  When  that  ceases,  the  club's 
reason  for  existence  will  cease.  So  long  as  we 
are  thus  considerate,  never  allowing  our  club  life 
to  absorb  the  attention  that  belongs  to  our  home 
life,  just  so  long  may  our  club  husband  snap  his 
fingers  at  the  people  who  try  to  pity  him.  Let 
the  critics  carp.  They  are  like  the  young  girl 
who  walked  through  her  uncle's  chair-factory, 
and  gazed  at  the  rows  upon  rows  of  chairs,  say- 
ing, 'Why,  uncle,  what  can  you  ever  do  with  all 
these  chairs  ?' 

"  'Don't  you  fret,  Maria,  settin'-down  ain't 
goin'  out  o'  fashion !' 

"The  making  of  homes  and  cherishing  those 
in  them  is  not  going  out  of  fashion,  and  the  club 
husband  would  be  the  first  to  agree  to  it." 

The  club  is  meant,  primarily,  for  all  classes 
of  women.  The  constitution  of  about  every  club 
in  the  land  will  tell  you  that  it  is  banded  together 
for  the  elevation  of  women  in  its  own  commu- 
nity and  for  the  purpose  of  bringing  them  to- 
gether for  moral  and  social  advancement — or 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

words  to  that  effect.  If  this  means  anything,  it 
means  that  the  butcher's  wife  and  the  baker's 
wife  and  the  candlestick-maker's  wife  are  on  a 
level  in  the  club  with  the  wives  and  daughters 
of  millionaires,  should  the  latter  condescend  to 
become  members;  though,  for  that  matter,  in 
these  latter  days  some  of  our  greatest  million- 
aires are  butchers  and  bakers  and  candlestick- 
makers,  dignified  by  the  names  of  pork-packers, 
biscuit  producers  and  silver  manufacturers.  And 
yet  in  our  clubs  are  a  great  many  women  who 
find  it  hard  to  make  both  ends  meet.  Many  of 
these  are  quite  as  well  educated  as  any  member 
of  the  club  to  which  they  belong;  others  are  not; 
but  in  any  case  the  club  idea  places  all  on  an 
equality,  and  it  is  in  every  club  member's  power 
to  contribute  something  to  the  permanent  happi- 
ness of  all  the  others. 

There  are  some  women  to  whom  the  club 
brings  all  of  social  life  they  ever  know ;  indeed, 
in  these  days  of  hurry  and  worry  this  is  coming 
to  be  more  and  more  true  of  all  of  us.  There- 
fore let  us  give  out  all  the  sunshine  on  club 
days  that  we  possibly  can.  Let  us  then  ra- 
diate sweetness  and  light,  and  cease  from 
taking  our  pleasures  too  sadly  or  too  se- 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

riously.  And  the  paragrapher  who  looks  to 
women's  clubs  for  material  for  his  never- 
satisfied  hopper,  finds  here  the  same  attitude 
and  converts  it  into  cause  for  mirth.  We 
should  take  life  seriously,  because  it  is  a  solemn 
thing;  but  on  the  other  hand  there  is  no  need  of 
letting  our  Puritanic  inheritances  of  mind  and 
training  tinge  all  existence  with  gloom.  When 
we  set  out  to  have  a  good  time,  let  us  have  it. 
And  let  us  have  it  all  the  time.  Happiness  is 
more  a  habit  of  the  mind  than  anything  else. 
If  we  keep  ourselves  in  that  mental  frame,  ad- 
mitting nothing  but  the  sunlight  of  existence, 
sunshine  will  become  such  a  habit  with  us  that  we 
can  no  more  help  shedding  sunlight  around  us 
than  we  can  help  breathing.  Isn't  that  worth 
while?  And  the  club,  where  we  come  to  meet 
our  sisters  who  have  the  same  kind  of  trials  and 
difficulties  as  we  do,  is  one  of  the  places  where 
we  should  not  only  seek  to  gather  up  sunshine, 
but  to  scatter  it.  For  we  cannot  reap  what  we 
do  not  sow,  nor  reflect  what  is  not  in  the  soul. 

Above  all,  let  us  cease  here  all  sorts  of  petty 
criticism.  The  club  should  be  so  charged  with 
the  atmosphere  of  kindliness  and  good-will  that 
those  who  come  to  it  shall  receive  a  new  baptism 

[127] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  love  for  their  fellow-creatures.  Have  you 
ever  belonged  to  a  club  where  the  very  spirit  of 
things  was  so  charged  with  wrangling  and  petty 
criticism  and  smothering  hatred  that  you  have 
gone  home  feeling  that  nothing  but  a  Turkish 
bath  and  an  old-fashioned  revival  prayer-meet- 
ing could  ever  get  you  clean  again,  body  and 
soul?  Alas,  that  there  are  such  clubs  and 
women  enough  in  them  to  keep  them  alive.  But 
if  you  or  I  belong  to  such  an  one,  it  is  our  duty 
first  to  try  to  improve  matters,  and  failing  in 
that,  to  resign  membership  in  it.  We  owe  it  to 
our  immortal  souls  not  to  smirch  them  with 
hatred  and  wrangling  and  ill-temper,  whenever 
we  can  help  it ;  and  we  usually  can. 

It  is  so  easy  to  see  the  faults  or  the  ridiculous 
side  of  other  people.  In  the  average  club,  the 
actual  working  force  is  seldom  over  ten  per  cent, 
of  the  membership.  The  thinking  for  the  club 
is  done  by  a  few,  while  the  remainder  come  in  to 
reap  the  results  of  what  has  been  prepared,  often 
by  actual  "sweat  of  the  brow"  and  almost  the 
life-blood  of  that  small  remnant  which  consti- 
tutes the  working  force  and  is  rewarded  only  by 
having  its  several  names  recorded  as  a  committee. 
Would  it  not  seem,  then,  that  the  least  we  could 

[128] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

do — those  of  us  who  leave  the  work  to  others — 
is  to  be  lenient  to  the  shortcomings  of  the  com- 
mittee, if  there  seem  to  be  any?  It  is  so  easy  to 
criticise.  The  duty  of  extracting  motes  from 
other  people's  eyes  is  very  attractive,  but  there  is 
excellent  advice  on  the  subject  of  neglecting  the 
beam  in  our  own  eye  which  the  average  woman 
may  well  read,  mark,  learn,  and  inwardly  digest. 

If  the  club  is  not  making  us  better  women  in 
every  way,  broader-minded  and  more  liberal  in 
our  judgment  towards  the  rest  of  the  world, 
more  tolerant  of  other  people's  views,  more  fond 
of  our  home  and  more  interesting  to  those  who 
have  to  live  with  us  in  it,  more  hopeful  of  the 
future  and  less  satisfied  with  our  present  mental 
and  spiritual  acquirements,  more  interested  in 
the  uplifting  of  humanity,  yet  less  willing  to  cut 
off  our  home  ties,  more  loving  in  our  relations 
with  each  other,  more  tolerant  of  the  failings  of 
our  fellow-members  and  more  intolerant  of 
gossip  pertaining  thereto;  if  the  club  does  not 
mean  all  these  things  and  more,  then  we  would 
better  give  up  our  membership  and  take  up  the 
duties  of  home  exclusively. 

If  we  are  not  the  more  attractive  at  home  for 
the  broadening  and  developing  influence  of  the 
[129] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

club,  then  are  we  failing  to  grasp  the  significance 
of  what  the  club  should  mean.  If  a  woman 
comes  home  fresh  and  smiling  from  a  club  meet- 
ing, full  of  interest  in  matters  outside  the  four 
walls  of  her  home  and  ideas  regarding  them,  she 
can  do  so  much  more  for  her  family.  The 
woman  who  was  heard  to  say  that  she  was  saving 
her  money  to  go  and  hear  a  performance  of 
Mozart's  Twelfth  Mass  because  that  was  the 
regiment  her  husband  enlisted  in,  was  not  a  club 
woman  and  had  lacked  the  opportunities  which 
the  club  affords  for  picking  up  knowledge  on 
subjects  which  her  previous  education  had 
lacked.  We  need  more  perfectly  rounded  and 
thoroughly  developed  characters,  and  that  is  ex- 
actly what  the  club  should  mean  to  us  as  indi- 
viduals. 

They  say  women  have  no  sense  of  humor.  At 
least,  they — and,  of  course,  it  was  a  masculine 
"they" — said  it  in  former  times.  How  would  it 
work  to  put  more  humor  into  our  meetings? 
Say,  have  a  funny  programme  once  in  a  month 
or  a  winter?  Look  at  the  year  books,  for  in- 
stance. The  subjects  in  some  are  appallingly 
heavy:  "Slavery — Its  Rise  and  Extinction," 
"Rise  of  Political  Parties,"  "Evils  That  Menace 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

a  Republic."  Two-thirds  of  the  women  attend- 
ing come  from  homes  where  there  is  constant 
care  and  worry.  They  need  lightening  and 
heartening.  They  need  a  hearty  laugh.  On  the 
contrary,  everything  is  planned  to  "stimulate 
thought"  and  improve  the  mind.  Why  not  have 
one  afternoon  a  month  devoted  to  everyone  tell- 
ing the  very  funniest  thing  she  ever  read,  saw, 
or  heard?  Or  have  one  member  relate  some 
mirth-provoking  story?  There  will  surely  be 
some  one  who,  like  Artemus  Ward,  was  so 
"patriotic  as  to  sacrifice  all  his  wife's  relations  to 
the  cause  of  liberty";  and  the  funniest  things 
that  happen  are  not  always  told.  Sometimes  be- 
cause there  is  no  one  to  appreciate  them.  Some- 
body suggests  that  "if  any  sedate  member  object 
to  such  levity  she  could  have  the  next  meeting 
of  a  grim  character  and  discuss  'Whether  the 
increase  of  cremation  would  affect  the  price  of 
pottery'  or  'Should  a  funeral  be  held  in  the 
morning  or  the  afternoon?'  Women's  clubs  are 
a  good  thing  and  their  price  is  above  rubies,  but 
put  a  few  pickles  and  salads  in  your  solid  repast, 
and  let  the  drawn  lines  of  thought  relax  over  a 
little  bit  of  nonsense." 

Anyone  who  has  appeared  on  the  platform 

[131] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

before  women's  audiences,  with  a  strain  of 
humor  showing  through  the  talk,  can  appreciate 
their  plaint  that  we  do  not  respond  quickly  to 
satire  or  to  mild  uhits."  Wit  must  be  sharp  to 
catch  the  average  woman.  Why  is  it  that  we  do 
not  laugh  more,  and  laugh  more  heartily? 
"Have  we  gotten  the  idea  in  some  cobwebbed 
corner  of  our  brains  that  it  is  wicked  to  be 
merry,"  says  one  club-woman  on  this  subject, 
"or  are  we  indeed  the  'serious  sex,'  so  called, 
and  hopelessly  so;  or  is  our  humor,  as  Mr.  Harry 
Thurston  Peck  says  it  is,  'entirely  superficial'— 
that  is,  put  on  for  the  occasion?  No  one  ques- 
tions that  there  is  plenty  of  laughter,  at  least  of 
smile,  among  women,  but  it  lacks  sincerity ;  it  has 
not  the  earnest  ring  of  genuine  merriment.  If 
we  stop  to  question  the  reason  why,  and  if  we  are 
scientifically  inclined  we  cannot  fail  to  do  so,  as 
a  lack  of  humor  assigns  a  race  to  a  lower  order 
of  development,  we  find  the  answer  to  be  one  of 
two  causes.  First,  women,  as  a  whole,  look  at 
life  in  all  its  relations  from  an  intensely  personal 
standpoint.  For  example,  if  you  ask  one  to  ad- 
mire a  gown,  a  carpet  or  a  picture,  she  will  do 
so,  and  then  add  (as  a  rule)  either  that  she  has 
or  did  have  one  almost  exactly  like  it.  If  you  tell 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

her  of  some  personal  experience,  she  usually 
grows  impatient  with  the  desire  to  relate  a  cor- 
responding one  of  her  own.  She  does  not  seem 
to  be  able  to  put  herself  out  of  the  equation.  For 
this  reason,  when  anything  genuinely  ludicrous 
occurs,  she  must  first  think  of  her  own  relation 
to  it,  whether  by  any  possibility  the  laugh  can  be 
turned  against  herself,  and  by  this  time  the  spon- 
taneity of  the  laughter,  its  genuineness,  has  van- 
ished. This,  I  find  to  be  one  cause.  Another 
is  her  persistent  clinging  to  the  small  burdens  of 
life.  Men,  most  of  them,  seem  able  to  drop 
even  very  heavy  business  cares  when  they  enter 
the  home  life;  but  woman  too  often-carries  these 
everywhere — in  her  pleasure  excursions,  to  her 
afternoon  teas;  even,  and  perhaps  more  often 
than  anywhere  else,  to  her  couch.  One  woman 
told  me  that  she  arranged  all  her  plans  and  all 
her  meals  for  the  next  day  after  she  was  in  her 
bed  at  night.  How,  then,  can  women  help  being 
serious,  when  the  mind  is  always  heavily  bur- 
dened, when  it  carries  about  with  it  an  uncon- 
scious, but  real,  weight,  which  it  never  discards, 
and  which  never  leaves  it  free  and  open  to  im- 
pressions?" 

Once  in  a  while  you  find  a  woman  who  does 

[133] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

not,  like  the  snail,  carry  her  house  on  her  back. 
The  ability  to  cast  it  off  is  certainly  an  accom- 
plishment which  every  one  should  cultivate,  and 
the  more  she  gets  interested  in  outside  affairs — 
world  interests — the  less  likely  she  is  to  become 
narrowed.  That  there  are  still  clubs  which  de- 
vote themselves  to  the  pursuit  of  culture  as  ob- 
tained from  encyclopaedias  and  who  take  their 
mental  pabulum  from  the  mouths  of  babes  and 
sucklings,  and  that  there  are  still  women  who 
make  a  fetish  of  their  clubs,  erecting  false 
standards  of  life  until  their  homes  are  left  unto 
them  desolate,  must  be  admitted.  It  is  a  signifi- 
cant fact,  however,  that  women  are  being  called 
upon  to  consider  problems,  civic  and  social, 
which  require  a  broader  training  than  it  was 
possible  for  them  to  obtain  a  generation  or  more 
ago.  This  training  the  woman's  college  and  the 
woman's  club,  when  properly  conducted,  supply, 
the  latter,  especially,  giving  to  women  who  have 
missed  a  college  training  the  opportunity  of  keep- 
ing up  intellectual  life  and  of  putting  newly  ac- 
quired knowledge  to  practical  use  in  some  line  of 
economic  endeavor  or  social  service,  for  the  day 
has  not  yet  passed  when  the  woman's  club  may 
be  styled  the  "middle-aged  woman's  university." 

[134] 


ON  WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

No;  let  us  have  our  clubs  and  work  in  them 
together,  for  so  shall  we  gain  new  ideas  and  a 
more  thorough  understanding  of  the  real  sister- 
hood of  our  sex.  We  shall  renew  our  strength 
as  the  eagles,  and  our  belief  in  each  other  as 
actual  living  factors  in  the  world's  work.  And 
if  the  club  has  an  altruistic  basis,  if  it  has  a 
clause  in  its  constitution  about  being  the  means 
of  ''elevating  this  community,"  if  it  is  really 
working  for  some  actual  barriers,  then  let  the 
public  know  it  by  every  possible  means.  One  of 
the  hopeful  signs  of  club-work  is  that  there  are 
few  clubs  left  that  consider  their  papers  and  dis- 
cussions too  sacred  to  be  shared  with  common 
folk. 

Of  course,  there  is  danger  of  running  to  the 
opposite  extreme.  Those  clubs  whose  most 
laborious  efforts  seem  to  lie  in  serving  tea  once 
a  month  and  providing  a  literary  programme 
that  is  indeed  milk  for  babes  are  too  often  in- 
clined to  rush  into  print  with  elaborated  accounts 
of  table  decorations  and  good  gowns,  but  even 
that  shows  a  hospitable  spirit,  does  it  not?  At 
least,  they  are  setting  a  good  example  to  clubs 
whose  discussions  and  papers,  if  accurately  re- 
ported, would  be  of  immense  value  to  younger 

[135] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

clubs  and  to  the  outside  world  of  women  who 
cannot  attend  the  meetings.  For  even  the  occa- 
sional woman  who  boasts  that  she  never  belonged 
to  a  club  reads  the  club  column  in  her  favorite 
newspaper. 

Exclusiveness,  after  all,  is  only  another  name 
for  selfishness.  And  selfishness  is  utterly  and 
thoroughly  incompatible  with  the  idea  of 
women's  clubs.  The  club  motif  is  helpfulness, 
and  that  is  a  quality  diametrically  opposed  to 
selfishness.  We  might  go  further  and  say  that 
the  sensitiveness  which  so  many  of  us  plead  is 
only  another  phase  of  selfishness — and  none  of 
us  have  a  right  to  plead  that.  Why  is  it 
that  some  words  we  roll  as  a  sweet  morsel 
under  our  tongues,  while  their  definitions  we 
abhor  ? 

Let  us,  as  club-women,  make  some  good  reso- 
lutions and  then  keep  them. 

Whereas,  we  are  all  human  and  therefore  love 
gossip,  let  us  resolve : 

That  we  will  cultivate  a  spirit  of  love  and  pa- 
tience for  every  woman  in  the  club. 

That  if  we  hear  a  single  word  of  criticism  on 
her  words  or  actions  or  dress  or  face  or  figure, 
we  will  not  repeat  it. 

[136] 


ON   WOMEN'S   CLUBS 

That  we  will  not  answer  such  criticisms,  ex- 
cept to  say  something  good  of  the  assailed. 

That  we  will  make  the  club  a  place  where 
helpfulness  and  kindliness  go  hand  in  hand  with 
inspiration. 

That  the  Golden  Rule  is  just  as  good  a  guide 
to  club  life  as  to  home  life. 

And  that  we  will  adopt  it  and  practice  it. 

And  let  us  reflect  that  if  the  club  movement 
were  not  a  good  thing  we  would  not  find  a  mil- 
lion of  the  best  women  in  our  country  in  it. 

I  have  seen  many  club  mottoes  and  club  plat- 
forms in  my  day  and  generation,  but  the  follow- 
ing seems  to  me  the  best.  It  originated  with  the 
Lincoln  (Neb.)  club-women: 

"Ours  is  an  inclusive,  departmental  club. 
Since  its  object  is  to  help  and  be  helped,  the  fol- 
lowing women  are  invited  to  become  mem- 
bers : — 

1.  The  university  graduate. 

2.  The  woman  of  common  school  educa- 

tion. 

3.  The  self-educated  woman. 

4.  The  woman  who  belongs  to  other  clubs. 

5.  The  non-club  woman. 

[137] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

6.  The  woman  who  does  not  believe  in 

clubs. 

7.  The  woman  who  does  not  wish  to  join 

a  department. 

8.  The  woman  who  wants  to  attend  the 

club  meetings  but  twice  a  year. 

9.  The  woman  who  wants  to  be  a  member 

for  the  name  of  it. 

10.  The  tired  woman,  full  of  domestic  re- 

sponsibilities, who  wants  to  be  a 
sponge,  fold  her  hands,  take  in  what 
the  bright  free  woman  who  needs  an 
audience,  has  learned,  and  then  go 
home  refreshed  to  her  treadmill. 

11.  The  woman  without  companionship. 

12.  The  young  woman  and  the  young-old 


woman." 


[138] 


XII 

ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 

THIS  is  not  a  chapter  on  "What  to  wear 
and  how  to  wear  it."  It  is  not  a  ques- 
tion altogether  of  becoming  and  fash- 
ionable attire.  It  is,  rather,  of  our  clothes  and 
their  relation  to  the  rest  of  the  world  that  I 
would  speak.  We  talk  a  great  deal  about  art; 
is  it  not  just  as  desirable  in  dress  as  anywhere  ? 
God  meant  women  to  be  attractive  just  as  He 
meant  flowers  to  be  lovely  and  birds  to  sing. 
Why,  then,  should  women  of  earnest  purpose 
think  it  advances  their  work  to  make  frumps  of 
themselves  ? 

Is  there  a  shy,  poorly  dressed  woman  coming 
to  your  church,  always  taking  a  back  seat  and 
slipping  off  like  a  frightened  lamb  when  the  ser- 
vice is  over?  Hunt  her  out  and  say  something 
pleasant  to  her.  And  remember,  especially  if 
you  can  afford  gorgeous  raiment  yourself,  that 
[139] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

that  very  woman  may  have  something  for  you. 
Try  it  and  see.  I  have  often  been  asked  if  I  do 
not  consider  it  wrong  for  a  rich  woman  to  wear 
better  clothes  to  her  club  than  the  average  mem- 
ber can  afford.  I  say  No.  As  long  as  women 
are  women  half  the  pleasure  of  going  out  any- 
where, even  to  church,  lies  in  the  opportunity  it 
gives  for  seeing  what  other  women  wear.  And  it 
does  not  follow,  because  we  cannot  wear  rich 
clothing  ourselves,  that  we  are  unable  to  bear 
the  sight  of  it  displayed  on  the  person  of  an- 
other woman  without  that  secret  stirring  of  pride 
and  all  uncharitableness  of  which  Saint  Paul 
speaks  so  eloquently.  On  the  contrary,  most  of 
us  delight  in  beautiful  things,  and  it  is  a  pleasure 
to  see  fine  clothes,  even  if  we  cannot  behold  them 
under  our  own  roof-tree  and  in  our  own  ward- 
robes. Another  thing.  No  woman  likes  to  feel 
that  she  is  being  dressed  down  to,  or  that  some 
other  woman  is  pitying  her  because  her  raiment 
is  not  costly.  If  the  choice  lies  between  feeling 
that  some  other  woman  can  wear  better  things 
than  I  do,  or  the  consciousness  that  this  other 
woman  feels  that  she  can  and  is  trying  to  dress 
down  to  the  limits  of  my  purse,  give  me  the 
former;  I  will  try  to  bear  the  sight  of  her  fine 
[140] 


ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 

clothes  with  patience  and  to  believe  that  my  soul 
is  above  the  glitter  of  outside  adornment.  For 
a  woman's  a  woman  for  a'  that. 

The  time  is  coming — we  see  it  already  around 
the  corner — when  clothes  do  not  make  the 
woman.  The  plain  little  woman  whose  garb  is 
just  about  as  noticeable  as  the  feathers  of  a  little 
brown  sparrow  is  quite  as  apt  to  be  the  leading 
spirit  in  her  club  or  town  or  State,  as  the  one 
with  reception  gowns  from  Felix  and  tailor  suits 
from  Redfern.  And  yet  why  should  anybody 
speak  or  think  disparagingly  of  a  woman  be- 
cause she  follows  Shakespeare's  advice,  "Costly 
thy  raiment  as  thy  purse  can  buy"?  May  there 
not  be  just  as  much  uncharitableness  among 
women  in  this  direction  as  in  the  other?  Possibly 
a  woman  is  abundantly  able  to  wear  a  tailor 
gown  that  costs  a  hundred  dollars  or  more,  and 
her  husband  is  more  than  particular  about  her 
dress.  Some  husbands  are.  Is  it  her  duty  to 
wear  a  cheaper  gown  because  some  of  her  sisters 
must? 

Here  is  a  nice  question  in  club  ethics.  One's 
husband  may  count  his  money  by  the  hundred 
thousands  or  even  the  millions ;  both  he  and  the 
children  may  be  strenuous  about  the  mother's 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

clothes.  What  is  her  duty?  Shall  she  go  against 
the  wishes  of  her  own  family,  not  to  mention 
her  personal  taste  in  the  matter,  and  studiously 
avoid  wearing  good  gowns  when  she  goes  to  the 
club — simply  because  there  are  women  there 
whose  husbands  can  scarcely  afford  the  "ready- 
made  tailor"  or  the  home-seamstress-made  silk 
which  they  are  wearing? 

And  as  some  woman  has  already  said,  should 
it  be  inconsistent  with  the  Federation  idea  for  the 
woman  who  can  afford  it,  and  who  has  always 
dressed  well,  to  appear  elegantly  gowned  at  the 
conventions  ?  Inconsistency  would  lie  in  the  dis- 
carding of  her  usual  apparel  for  the  time  being, 
and  the  substitution  of  plainer  garments,  and  by 
so  doing  she  would  prove  conclusively  that  she 
was  not  really  democratic. 

Should  Robert  of  Lincoln's  Quaker  wife — 
pretty  and  sensible  and  plain  and  brown — wish 
to  change  the  brilliant  plumage  of  the  oriole 
when  she  flits  into  her  range  of  vision  ?  I  think 
not;  it  would  not  be  natural  or  fair  or  kind. 
And  is  it  necessary  in  order  to  be  effective  in 
social  service,  in  order  to  be  consistent,  in  order 
to  reach  fulness  of  power,  that  we  be  so  serious 
about  it  all  ?  I  like  the  expression  which  one  of 


ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 

our  ablest  women  used  when  she  spoke  of  work- 
ing uin  gay  self-forgetfulness."  My  mother 
used  to  tell  me  that  the  best-dressed  women  were 
those  who,  having  donned  their  pretty  clothes 
and  satisfied  themselves  that  they  were  all 
right,  thought  no  more  about  them,  but  went 
out  into  company  with  other  women  with 
no  more  consciousness  of  clothes  than  the 
flowers  and  birds  seem  to  have  of  their  col- 
ors and  music.  It  is  true  that  we  should 
work  hard  for  what  is  most  dear  to  us,  but 
not  so  seriously  that  we  cannot  see  God's 
beautiful  sunshine  and  brilliant  coloring  of  sky 
and  field. 

And  so  I  contend,  from  a  purely  aesthetic 
standpoint,  for  the  continuation  of  the  wearing 
of  pretty  gowns  and  rare  jewels  by  the  pos- 
sessors of  them.  Sidney  Lanier,  in  "My 
Springs,"  one  of  the  poems  addressed  to  his 
wife,  after  speaking  of  the  "loves"  she  held  for 
everything  in  the  great  world,  says: 

"And  loves  for  all  that  God  and  man 
In  art  and  nature  make  or  plan, 
And  lady-loves  for  spidery  lace 
And  broideries  and  supple  grace. 

[143] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

"And  diamonds  and  the  whole  sweet  round 
Of  littles  that  large  life  compound, 
And  love  for  God  and  God's  bare  truth, 
And  loves  for  Magdalen  and  Ruth." 

"We  are  all  living  in  a  kindergarten  for 
the  blind,"  said  a  prominent  divine  at  Mr. 
Anagnos'  beautiful  institution  in  Boston.  "Hav- 
ing eyes,  perhaps  we  do  not  see  that  best  and 
highest  life  of  the  divine  which  awaits  us  just 
beyond  our  ken." 

The  French  gown  and  gorgeous  hat  which  we 
envy,  or  at  best  admire,  may  cover  a  nature  full 
of  courage  and  healing  for  our  secret  woes,  if  we 
were  not  so  blind  we  could  not  see;  and  in  our 
turn  we  might  supply  some  stimulus  which  she 
lacks.  And  the  woman  in  the  ill-fitting,  home- 
made gown  in  the  corner  might,  possibly,  bring 
positive  blessing  to  both  of  us  and  others.  We 
each  have  something  for  the  other.  Have  we 
given  our  share  ? 

"Why  don't  you  bring  some  of  your  fine 
gowns  up  here  with  you  ?"  asked  the  country  rela- 
tives of  a  rich  woman.  "We  like  to  see  them 
even  if  our  meeting-house  and  rag-carpeted  sit- 
ting-rooms don't  seem  just  the  place  for  them." 


ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 

A  great  many  women  feel  the  same  way.  They 
like  to  see  pretty  clothes,  even  if  they  cannot 
wear  them.  So  let  us  not  worry  over  this  matter 
of  dress.  It  will  right  itself.  If  the  woman  who 
is  apt  to  overdress — to  whom  dress  is  the  main 
object  in  life — comes  into  contact  with  higher- 
minded  women,  she  will  soon  absorb  a  higher 
ideal  and  come  to  feel  that  there  are  greater  pur- 
poses than  are  covered  by  the  Paris  fashion 
plates,  and  worthier  subjects  of  contemplation 
and  discussion  than  whether  to  ruffle  or  not  to 
ruffle  the  skirt.  And  do  these  not  need  such 
help  just  as  much  as  those  that  dwell  in  low 
places  and  perhaps  long  ago  learned  to  combine 
high  thinking  with  plain  living? 

Oh,  sisters,  we  none  of  us  realize  one  another's 
needs.  How  do  we  know  that  she  whom  we 
have  been  envying  as  possessing  everything  heart 
could  wish,  is  not  the  most  miserable  of  women  ? 
How  do  we  know  that  the  quiet,  insignificant 
woman  in  sparrow-like  raiment  has  not  exactly 
the  help  which  we  are  silently  craving?  Let 
us  come  out  of  our  shells  and  see.  Let  us  make 
of  life  something  more  than  a  series  of  good 
times,  when  we  have  gone  forth  arrayed  in  gor- 
geous attire  and  in  search  of  amusement  only. 

[145] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

Have  we  been  of  those  who  shirk  duty  by 
leaving  it  to  those  who  like  to  work,  while 
we  have  acted  as  sponges  to  soak  up  the  waters 
of  gladness  set  running  by  the  untiring  efforts 
of  others  ? 

Or  have  we,  through  unselfish  and  self-forget- 
ting labor  for  the  advancement  of  all,  grown  up 
to  a  broader  outlook  on  life,  a  more  tolerant  eye 
for  the  shortcomings  of  others  and  a  wider 
charity  for  humanity  everywhere?  Only  by 
losing  ourselves  do  we  find  our  best  selves. 
There  are  so  many  things  we  can  do  to  brighten 
the  life-path  for  others,  and  almost  without  effort 
on  our  part.  A  kind  word,  a  helpful  suggestion, 
a  pleasant  smile  in  answer  to  a  cross  look ;  these 
cost  nothing,  and  if  we  cultivate  the  habit  we 
shall  carry  them  unconsciously  wherever  we  go; 
and  they  often  mean  so  much. 

There  is  the  sister  who  comes  from  a  home 
where  the  most  rigid  economy  must  be  practiced, 
or  where  the  children,  dear  as  they  are,  wear  on 
overworked  nerves  and  brain;  where  death  has 
brought  havoc  and  desolation;  where  the  hus- 
band is  surly  and  penurious;  where  scandal  or 
disgrace  has  been,  or  where  sorrows  worse  than 
death  have  brought  darkness  and  continual 


ON  THE  ETHICS  OF  CLOTHES 

heartache.  Do  you  think  it  does  not  matter  to 
such  whether  you  give  them  cordial  greeting, 
whether  your  presence  is  like  the  blessed  sun- 
light, whether  your  life  of  un-self-conscious  faith 
and  hope  beams  across  their  way,  even  for  a  half 
hour?  How  seldom  it  occurs  to  any  of  us  to 
ask  ourselves  what  is  our  real,  unconscious  in- 
fluence among  our  sisters. 

Somebody  has  said  that  to  be  warped  uncon- 
sciously by  the  magnetic  influence  of  all  around 
is  the  destiny  of  even  the  greatest  souls.  If  this 
is  true,  how  much  more  is  it  likely  that  we  com- 
mon souls  shall  be  swayed  by  outside  spiritual 
forces.  Let  us  see  to  it  that  we  are  not  like 
Hosea  Bigelow's  character  who 

"Might  be  a  marvel  of  easy  delightfulness 
If  he  would  not  sometimes  leave  the  r  out  of 
sprightfulness." 

Let  us,  also,  recall  Dorothea's  motto  in  "Mid- 
dlemarch" : 

"I  have  a  belief  of  my  own,  and  it  comforts 
me,  that  by  desiring  what  is  perfectly  good,  even 
when  we  do  not  know  what  it  is,  and  cannot  do 
what  we  would,  we  are  a  part  of  the  divine 

EH?] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

power  against  evil,  widening  the  skirts  of  light 
and   making  the   struggle  with   darkness   nar- 


rower." 


A  good  motto  for  us  all,  isn't  it? 


[148] 


XIII 

ON  THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

THE  position  of  woman  seems  to  be  worry- 
ing a  lot  of  people  a  great  deal  nowa- 
days. Whether  she  is  or  is  not  psycho- 
logically inferior  to  man,  whether  "emancipa- 
tion" is  a  good  thing  for  her,  whether  it  is  better 
for  her  to  vote  intelligently  or  stay  at  home  and 
knit  stockings  mechanically,  whether  she  should 
be  mentally  and  physically  capable  of  supporting 
herself  or  be  content  to  be  the  more  or  less  beau- 
tiful appendage  of  some  man;  these  are  questions 
that  are  considered  weighty  enough  to  fill  news- 
papers, magazines  and  even  books  with  argu- 
ments pro  and  con.  And  woman  continues  to 
spell  herself  with  a  capital  W. 

Dyspeptic  men  and  dyspeptic  women  with  a 
literary  tendency  are  rushing  into  print,  and  both 
long  and  short-haired  logicians  are  taking  to  the 
platform  in  the  vain  endeavor  to  put  woman 
where  she  belongs — although  the  exact  location 
[H9] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  that  place  has  not  been  clearly  determined 
nor  concisely  defined.  And  there  is  considerable 
doubt  extant  as  to  her  remaining  there,  when 
the  learned  disputants  have  succeeded  in  putting 
her  in  the  right  spot.  The  modern  woman  seems 
to  be  more  uncertain,  coy  and  hard  to  please  than 
those,  even,  that  puzzled  the  poet. 

But  the  most  encouraging  thing  about  it  is  the 
position  of  the  average  woman  on  these  ques- 
tions. The  world  is  made  up — let  us  devoutly 
thank  Heaven — of  average  women,  and  it  is  the 
sanity  of  these  that  will  save  the  situation.  Noth- 
ing ever  interested  me  more  than  the  discussion 
at  a  State  Federation  Convention  a  few  years 
ago  on  this  very  topic.  One  afternoon  was  given 
up  entirely  to  the  discussion  of  the  position  of 
woman — not  by  experts  and  psychological  stu- 
dents, but  by  the  reading  and  thinking  average 
club  women  themselves.  And  it  was  indeed 
"happifying,"  as  the  good  old  Methodist  used 
to  say,  to  behold  the  good  sense  and  sweet  rea- 
sonableness of  these  women.  The  erratic  notions 
of  Charlotte  Perkins  Stetson  Gilman,  the  erotic 
ideas  of  Mme.  Marholm,  the  vagaries  of  Olive 
Schreiner,  and  the  dyspeptic  pessimism  of  some 
of  our  recent  novelists  all  came  up  for  considera- 


ON   THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

tion,  and  it  was  with  pious  joy  that  I  noted  that 
the  distorted  views  of  woman  in  the  economic 
and  the  domestic  world  have  little  weight  with 
the  average  woman  who  reads  and  who  has 
fallen  into  the  pernicious  but  enjoyable  habit  of 
thinking  for  herself  and  forming  her  own  con- 
clusions. 

It  may  be  that  what  we  are  told  is  true  and 
not  one  woman  in  five  thousand  is  fit  to  bring  up 
her  own  children,  but  it  looks  to  me  as  if  the 
aforesaid  average  woman  with  a  mind-which- 
doesn't-hurt-her-because-she-knows-how-to-use  it, 
belongs  to  a  class  which  makes  a  serious  matter 
of  child-study  when  God  sends  her  children.  It 
may  be  that  woman's  place  is  still  at  the  loom 
and  the  spindle  and  the  mending-basket,  but 
judging  from  the  average  woman's  remarks  she 
has  other  duties  of  more  importance  in  the  eco- 
nomic world  in  these  days  of  machinery. 

Once  upon  a  time  a  woman,  writing  for  a 
foreign  review,  bewailed  the  absence  of  serious 
concentrated  thought  among  women,  and  ad- 
vanced as  the  reason  therefor  their  gregarious 
habits  and  crowded  life,  and  their  utter  disability 
to  apply  to  themselves  the  benefits  of  solitude. 
Women  as  a  class  do  depend  on  each  other  or 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

upon  the  men  of  their  acquaintance  for  their 
opinions,  whether  on  social  or  political  themes. 

And  yet  women  are  not,  all  of  them,  so  abso- 
lutely without  properly  correlated  opinions  as 
certain  writers  would  have  us  believe.  That  she 
is  often  defective  in  consecutive  mental  training 
derives  from  influences  beginning  with  the  em- 
bryo woman  in  her  cradle.  She  is  tended  by  a 
nurse  who  is  not  allowed  to  "turn  her  off"  in  the 
slightest  degree.  As  soon  as  she  can  talk  she  is 
provided  with  a  nursery  governess  and  later  with 
chaperones  and  companions,  tutors  and  gov- 
ernesses, and  is  finally  sent  to  boarding-school, 
where  she  lives,  moves  and  has  her  being  in  "her 
set."  A  boy  may  be  taught  to  amuse  himself 
before  he  walks.  A  boy  may  play  alone  and  his 
elders  are  only  too  thankful  if  he  will.  When 
older,  a  boy  may  go  off  alone  for  delightful  half 
days  in  the  woods  or  follow  the  bent  of  his 
nature  or  his  own  sweet  will. 

But  the  girl  imbibes  with  her  mother's  milk 
an  indefinite  idea  that  she  must  not  be  alone. 
Whether  it  be  the  effect  of  injudicious  nursery 
tales  or  the  early  development  of  her  social  na- 
ture, she  is  trained  with  a  certain  deference  to 
that  idea,  and  instead  of  a  healthy,  natural  being, 


ON   THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

capable  of  standing  on  her  own  feet,  intellec- 
tually and  morally,  she  grows  up,  unavoidably, 
with  an  unconscious  habit  of  leaning  on  others. 
Is  this  solely  due  to  the  unbiased  woman-nature? 
May  it  not  be  attributed,  as  we  say  in  New  Eng- 
land, to  her  bringing  up  ? 

Sometimes  she  never  experiences,  in  her  shel- 
tered and  measured  existence,  any  lack,  mental 
or  spiritual.  Sometimes,  indeed,  this  great  uni- 
verse with  all  its  mighty  forces  of  life  and  death 
and  love  and  passion  and  hatred,  is  nothing  to 
her  but  a  pretty  background  for  the  display  of 
fashions.  But  sooner  or  later  comes  to  more 
women  than  are  dreamed  of  in  the  philosophy  of 
the  world  a  great  crisis,  a  time  when  human  na- 
ture stands  stripped  of  all  false,  meretricious  pre- 
tences and  the  disillusionment  of  life  comes  upon 
her. 

"There  is  scarcely,"  says  our  review  writer, 
"one  man  in  a  thousand  who  at  some  time  in  his 
life  has  not  felt  and  indulged  the  impulse  to  step 
out  from  the  rank  and  file  of  his  familiars  and 
contemporaries,  and  envisage  his  own  nature. 
Not  a  man,  worthy  of  the  name,  but  has  searched 
for  and  found  himself — has  borne  out  his  own 
convictions,  and  wrestled  through  the  long  nights 

[153] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  his  own  youth  with  the  stern-browed  angel  of 
some  revelation." 

The  same  thing,  we  venture  to  assert,  happens 
to  thousands  of  women.  The  dreary  time  of  dis- 
illusionment comes  and  the  cutting  contrast  be- 
tween the  real  and  the  ideal  makes  itself  pain- 
fully felt.  Friends  die,  hopes  are  shattered,  the 
inexorable  facts  of  life  force  themselves  upon  us 
and  we  awake  from  the  golden  dreams  of  early 
life.  The  more  delicately  organized  a  woman 
is  the  deeper  the  springs  of  truth  in  her  lie,  and 
the  more  is  it  a  necessity  of  her  nature  that,  when 
the  spell  is  broken,  she  shall  stand  face  to  face 
with  the  inner  meaning  of  life,  that  she  shall 
search  and  find  herself.  Long  nights  are  spent 
in  passionate  protest,  in  earnest  struggling  for 
light,  in  eager  searching  for  truth.  Call  it 
morbid,  unhealthy,  if  you  will;  you  do  not  say  so 
of  man.  Many  a  thoughtful,  earnest  woman  of 
to-day,  under  whose  calm  demeanor  no  one  sus- 
pects an  extinct  crater,  dates  the  development  of 
her  intellectual  self  from  just  such  battles,  which 
resulted  in  the  conquest  of  self  and  petty  aims. 
The  soul-writhings  of  such  women  in  books  are 
overdrawn  and  unnatural.  Not  one  woman  in 
a  thousand  would  be  guilty  of  writing  such  self- 

[154] 


ON   THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

accusing,  self-revealing  scenes;  but  hundreds  of 
women  readers  recognize  the  state  of  mind,  and 
although  they  may  not  have  writhed  bodily  all 
night  on  the  floor  like  some  heroines  of  recent 
novels,  they  have  bidden,  after  reading  of  such, 
long  forgotten  ghosts  to  be  quiet. 

The  secret  of  our  late  President  McKinley's 
strength  was  his  mastery  over  self.  He  had 
himself  under  thorough  control.  He  did  not 
fear  self-communion,  for  he  was  sanely  balanced. 
The  quality  in  him  which  appealed  the  most 
strongly  to  women,  of  course,  was  his  unselfish 
devotion  to  his  womenkind.  His  mother  and  his 
wife  always  stood  first  in  his  heart,  and  he  was 
the  good  son  and  ideal  husband  before  he  was 
the  soldier  and  the  statesman.  Some  men  seem 
to  be  ashamed  of  being  true  to  their  women-folk; 
President  McKinley  was  great  enough  to  respect 
all  women  and  to  love  with  a  singularly  unselfish 
devotion  those  belonging  to  him. 

How  much  better  this  world  would  be  if  there 
were  more  such  characters;  if  people  were  con- 
tent to  be  simply  true  and  faithful  to  their  high- 
est ideals,  or  rather  were  equal  to  the  effort  of 
living  up  to  them.  It  is  easy  to  lie  awake  at 
night  or  sit  by  the  fire  and  dream  of  grand  and 

[155] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

noble  deeds;  it  is  another  thing  to  carry  those 
ideals  right  out  into  the  workaday  world  and 
face  the  battles  of  life  with  them.  So  much  de- 
pends on  the  way  we  carry  them,  however;  if 
we  carry  the  high  ideals  as  a  burden  on  our 
backs,  they  are  not  a  success.  Let  us  try  using 
them  as  a  shield. 

There  is  one  little  book  that  I  wish  could  be 
put  into  the  hands  of  every  woman.  And  then  I 
should  demand  a  promise  that  each  one  should 
read  a  chapter  in  it  on  retiring  every  night.  It 
is  called  "The  Magic  Seven"  and  was  written  by 
Lida  A.  Churchill,  who  has  struck  a  helpful 
chord  in  this  little  book  that  might  go  far  toward 
transforming  the  world,  if  the  world  would  stop 
long  enough  to  read  it. 

The  great  need  among  women  is  to  acquire 
self-poise  and  to  learn  self-control.  This  book 
comes  nearer  to  teaching  these  than  anything  I 
have  yet  seen,  although,  of  course,  it  all  depends 
on  the  woman  herself  whether  she  will  be  calm 
and  strong  and  self-reliant.  As  Miss  Churchill 
says:  "God  Himself  cannot  give  you  anything 
which  you  are  unwilling  or  unready  to  receive." 

Here  is  one  of  her  formulas.  Try  it,  and 
after  saying  it  over  every  day  in  the  quiet  of  your 

[156] 


ON   THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

own  room,  or  on  the  car,  or  in  the  midst  of 
crowds,  see  if  you  are  not  more  calm,  more  sure 
of  yourself,  more  trustful  of  God: 

"I  am  still  of  heart  and  of  tongue.  I  invite, 
and  I  hold  myself  in  the  attitude  to  receive,  the 
Intelligence  which  teaches,  the  Love  which  satis- 
fies and  protects,  the  Power  which  invincibilizes, 
the  Peace  which  blesses.  I  admit  nothing  into 
my  life  which  would  prevent  or  hinder  the  great- 
est soul-receptivity.  I  wait  in  the  silence  with 
and  for  God." 

But  we  must  not  forget  that  it  is  the  average 
woman  who  makes  or  unmakes  life  for  us.  She 
may  not  write  books,  nor  paint  pictures,  nor  be- 
come famous;  but  she  is  the  home-maker — the 
mother  of  the  world.  And  the  Average  Woman 
will  continue  right  along  at  the  old  stand  as  wife 
and  mother,  but  with  an  enlarged  sense  of  out- 
side responsibilities.  She  will  vote  wherever  the 
law  will  let  her  and  yet  mind  her  baby.  She  will 
study  polemics  in  clubs  and  higher  mathematics 
all  by  her  lonesome  and  yet  continue  to  order 
the  dinner  and,  if  necessary,  cook  it  herself;  and 
owing  to  the  spread  of  cooking  schools  and  do- 
mestic science  departments,  it  will  be  better 
cooked  and  more  daintily  served  than  of  yore. 

[157] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

No;  let  us  cease  to  worry  about  ourselves  or 
fret  our  souls  with  the  arguments  of  men  who 
know  next  to  nothing  about  us.  Every  man  has 
his  opinion  about  women  as  a  class,  but  in  nine 
hundred  and  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  thousand 
his  premises  are  all  drawn  from  the  women  of 
his  own  household.  So  that  if  he  sets  us  down 
as  weak-brained,  fickle,  and  vastly  inferior  to 
MAN,  we  can  easily  judge  of  the  women  of  his 
immediate  circle,  and  pity  him  accordingly. 

The  nineteenth  century  has  seen  a  wonderful 
change  in  the  position  of  woman  all  over  the 
world.  This  remark  is  so  trite  that  my  pencil 
blushes  to  record  it.  The  twentieth  century  is 
ushering  woman  in  as  a  very  decided  factor  in 
the  world's  progress  and  will  doubtless  bring  her 
into  greater  activities  and  prominence  than  ever ; 
but  God  instituted  woman  a  number  of  years 
ago,  when  He  set  certain  limits  to  her  physical 
development,  and  He  has  not  yet  shown  any  de- 
cided intention  of  changing  her  mental  qualities 
into  replicas  of  the  biped  He  created  a  short  time 
previous  and  called  man,  and  we  shall  continue 
to  be  just  plain  women  when  all  is  said  and  done. 

Not  but  what  that  greatest  room  in  the  world 
— the  room  for  improvement — is  still  open  to  us ; 


ON   THE   AVERAGE   WOMAN 

but  the  fun  of  it  is  that  so  many  more  are  all  the 
time  crowding  up  to  its  doors.  Women  as  a  class 
are  growing  more  intelligent  every  year ;  realiz- 
ing their  own  responsibilities,  inside  and  outside 
the  four  walls  of  home;  learning  to  balance 
themselves  and  to  walk  steadily  along  untried 
paths;  rejoicing  in  this  discovery  of  their  own 
mental  powers  and  yet  clinging  tightly  to  the  old 
family  loves  and  home  ties. 

So  let  us  not  worry  ourselves  over  the  dismal 
prophecies  of  great  men  as  to  the  position  of 
woman.  We  will  continue  to  meander  along  the 
pleasant  paths  of  improvement,  but  spell  our- 
selves with  a  small  w. 

God  made  us  all;  may  He  help  us  to  realize 
our  limitations  as  well  as  to  develop  our  utmost. 
Selah. 


[159] 


XIV 

ON  PUBLIC  DUTIES 

ONE  of  Mary  E.  Wilkins'  delightful 
heroines  remarks,  in  speaking  of  cer- 
tain would-be  leaders  of  social  reform 
in  her  village:  "I  don't  know  that  I  think  they 
are  so  much  above  us  as  too  far  to  one  side. 
Sometimes  it  is  longitude  and  sometimes  it  is 
latitude  that  separates  people."  "This  is  true," 
says  President  Roosevelt,  "and  the  philosophy 
it  teaches  applies  quite  as  much  to  those  who 
would  reform  the  politics  of  a  large  city,  or,  for 
that  matter,  of  the  whole  country,  as  to  those 
who  would  reform  the  society  of  a  hamlet."  But 
the  active  woman  of  to-day — and  much  more  the 
woman  of  to-morrow — is  not  in  danger  of  sep- 
arating herself  by  either  latitude  or  longitude. 
She  is  eager  to  help,  and  meets  her  problems 
half-way  with  outstretched  hands.  She  is  taking 
hold  of  all  sorts  of  municipal  matters  and  work- 
[i6oj 


ON  PUBLIC   DUTIES 

ing  against  unsanitary  conditions,  defective  sew- 
erage, poor  drainage,  impure  drinking  water  and 
the  practice  of  making  backyards,  alleys  and 
even  streets  the  dumping-ground  of  those  who 
are  too  negligent,  or  too  indolent  to  consider  the 
appearance  of  their  immediate  locality. 

"The  poor  ye  have  always  with  you,"  and  as 
Dr.  Babcock  has  said:  uTo  take  care  of  the 
lower  orders  is  essential  to  social  safety,  though 
the  words,  'Inasmuch  as  ye  did  it  to  the  least  of 
these/  had  never  been  spoken,  and  the  thought 
of  helping  humanity  should  be  some  little  com- 
fort, though  the  recognition  of  a  'cup  of  cold 
water'  had  never  been  dreamed  of.  To  help 
poor  children  to  learn  to  sew  cannot  compromise 
you  in  any  way.  To  prick  your  finger  in  the 
sewing-school  and  draw  one  little  red  drop,  is  in 
the  line  of  the  world's  redemption,  at  least  from 
ignorance  and  incapacity." 

But  to  this  mission  of  woman  from  simply 
altruistic  motives  we  can  add  that  divine  com- 
mission entrusted  to  Mary  at  the  door  of  the 
sepulchre  on  that  Sabbath  morning  nineteen  hun- 
dred years  ago,  so  that  she  is  working  every- 
where to  lift  little  children  out  of  degradation, 
to  teach  them,  to  make  of  them  good  citizens, 
[16!] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

to  abolish  child-labor.  And  is  it  not  true  that 
every  woman  working  in  a  quiet  way  for  the  im- 
provement of  those  in  her  immediate  neighbor- 
hood is  manifesting  the  spirit  of  the  scriptural 
injunction,  "Bear  ye  one  another's  burdens"? 

"The  women's  clubs  of  the  period,  with  their 
classes  for  intelligent  study  of  the  great  questions 
of  the  day, are  creating  a  newpolitical  economy," 
says  the  Hon.  Carroll  D.  Wright,  late  chief  of 
the  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics  in  Washington, 
and  no  man  in  this  country  is  better  fitted  to 
judge  of  the  economic  conditions  that  attend  any 
great  movement.  One  of  the  significant  features 
of  the  club  movement  is  that  our  deepest  think- 
ers, our  most  far-sighted  men  recognize  in  it  one 
of  the  great  forces  of  the  age.  It  is  all  well 
enough  for  one  or  two  brilliant  women  writers 
who  pride  themselves  on  belonging  to  no  wom- 
en's clubs  whatever,  to  direct  their  powers  of 
sarcasm  against  the  movement  and  to  flippantly 
observe  that  women's  clubs  are  a  fad,  or  to  in- 
veigh against  our  taking  ourselves  seriously.  We 
can  even  bear  that  Mr.  Bok  or  Mr.  Cleveland 
should  warn  his  readers  against  being  led  unwill- 
ingly into  public  life,  to  the  utter  neglect  of  but- 
tonless  husbands  and  starving  children;  these 


ON  PUBLIC  DUTIES 

things  are  outside  the  pale  of  serious  consid- 
eration. 

What  does  the  earnest,  thinking  woman  who 
reads  Drummond's  "Ascent  of  Man"  and  Rus- 
kin's  "Unto  This  Last"  care?  What  does  the 
woman  who  is  studying  the  great  humanitarian 
problem  of  to-day — whether  singly  or  in  classes 
— mind  if  a  magazine  writer  who  cares  more  for 
brilliancy  than  for  accuracy  takes  her  to  task  be- 
cause she  takes  the  fact  of  organized  effort  for 
bettering  present  conditions,  and  ministering  to 
great  human  needs,  seriously?  For  men  who 
think  and  read  and  observe  what  is  going  on  in 
the  world  to-day,  men  who  come  nearest  to  seeing 
what  are  the  present  economic  forces  and 
whither  they  are  tending — such  men  are  the 
quickest  to  recognize  women  as  an  important  fac- 
tor in  the  world's  progress,  and  are  the  most  cor- 
dial in  extending  a  hand-clasp  of  sympathy  and 
"God-speed"  to  any  specialized  movement 
among  us. 

The  day  has  gone  by  when  it  is  fair  or  safe 
to  arraign  men  for  conditions  which  hedge  in  a 
woman;  by  which  I  mean  that  the  men  of  this 
country  are  ready  and  willing  to  extend  a  help- 
ing hand  to  women  who  really  want  anything. 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

When  the  women  of  this  country  or  any  part  of 
it  rise  up  and  declare  in  a  body  that  they  want 
the  ballot,  for  instance,  they  will  get  it;  for  it 
is  not  the  men  who  are  keeping  it  from  us. 
When  the  women  of  America  come  forward 
ready  for  concerted  action  on  any  subject,  the 
men  are  with  them  as  a  rule.  Of  course  this 
refers  to  mankind  collectively,  not  individually, 
and  I  leave  it  to  any  woman  if  the  men  of  her 
household  are  not,  as  a  rule,  quite  in  sympathy 
with  her  outside  interests  and  work.  The  aver- 
age man  sees  in  some  measure  the  value  of  the 
club  movement.  The  thinking  man  and  the  one 
who  sees  below  the  surface  in  this  restless,  chang- 
ing, hopeful  age  goes  farther  and  recognizes 
that  with  all  our  shortcomings  and  superficialities 
we  have  at -heart  an  unquenchable  desire  to  do 
our  part  of  the  world's  work;  moreover,  that 
there  is  a  tremendous  psychological  significance 
in  the  banding  together  of  several  hundred  thou- 
sand women  all  actuated  by  the  same  purpose, 
even  if  the  movement  be  slightly  chaotic  and 
not  always  well  directed. 

The  fact  that  thousands  of  earnest  clubwomen 
all  over  this  great  country  are  studying  its  social 
conditions  is  of  tremendous  significance.  We  be- 


ON  PUBLIC   DUTIES 

gan  in  club  life  by  studying  literature,  present 
and  past.  Then  we  took  up  history,  and  from 
comparing  causes  and  effects  in  the  past  we  nat- 
urally come  to  studying  the  economic  conditions 
of  to-day.  Once  take  up  this  question  and  we 
become  a  powerful  factor  in  its  evolution. 
Women  can  create  and  maintain  public  senti- 
ment, and  it  is  the  thinking  women  who  usually 
become  club  women.  The  new  political  econ- 
omy, which  means  the  care  and  culture  of  man- 
kind, to-day  demands  our  attention.  There  are 
many  phases  of  it,  but  most  of  our  studies  bear 
upon  it  in  one  form  or  another.  It  is  not  pleas- 
ant to  hear  about  women  who  make  shirtwaists 
for  forty-eight  cents  a  do'zen  and  ruffled  skirts 
for  nineteen  cents  apiece,  and  thankful — poor 
creatures ! — to  get  even  that.  It  is  heartbreak- 
ing to  hear  of  the  girls  who  work  in  laundries 
at  three  to  six  dollars  a  week,  and  at  a  risk  of 
having  hand  or  foot  crushed  in  the  mangle.  It 
is  quite  heartrending  to  be  told  of  the  hardships 
that  befall  a  girl  who  has  lost  her  hand  and  must 
find  some  way  to  earn  her  scanty  living.  But 
when  we  are  told  how  we  can  help  these  condi- 
tions the  matter  becomes  practical.  When  we 
are  shown  that  by  patronizing  bargain  counters 

[165] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

and  buying  cheap  shirtwaists  and  petticoats  we 
encourage  these  conditions,  and  it  is  explained 
how  we  can  improve  matters  for  the  laundry 
girl,  then  our  feelings  have  not  been  harrowed 
in  vain. 

When  we  come  to  realize  that  it  rests  with  us 
to  create  a  demand  for  better  conditions  we  are 
ready  for  our  part  of  the  work.  We  may  de- 
plore the  existence  of  "yellow  journals,"  but  if 
we  buy  them  we  encourage  their  sale  and  con- 
tribute to  their  support.  W^e  may  believe  the 
sweatshop  to  be  a  pet  institution  of  Satan,  but  if 
we  buy  its  products  we  are  encouraging  the  men 
who  keep  up  its  existence.  One  of  the  most  hope- 
ful auguries  for  the  future  of  the  concerted 
"woman  movement"  is  the  fact  that  it  has  defi- 
nitely recognized  its  duty  with  respect  to  indus- 
trial conditions.  Thousands  of  women  and  chil- 
dren are  suffering  from  the  lack  of  intelligent 
sympathy  as  well  as  from  scanty  wages,  impure 
air,  improper  food  and  all  the  other  things  that 
are  attendant  on  grinding  poverty.  Shall  we — 
because  fate  has  cast  our  lot  in  happier  condi- 
tions— ignore  these  sisters  of  ours?  Shall  we 
not,  rather,  set  about  the  earnest  study  of  our 
duty  in  the  premises  ? 

[166] 


ON  PUBLIC   DUTIES 

You  remember  the  story  of  Henry  Ward 
Beecher,  who  hired  a  horse  at  a  livery  stable  to 
go  for  a  drive.  Before  starting  he  said,  "That 
is  a  fine-looking  animal;  is  he  as  good  as  he 
looks?"  The  owner  replied,  "Mr.  Beecher,  that 
horse  will  work  in  any  place  you  put  him  and 
do  all  that  any  horse  can  do."  And  Mr.  Beecher 
eyed  the  animal  still  more  admiringly  and  re- 
marked, "Well,  I  wish  to  goodness  he  was  a 
member  of  my  church."  Now,  that  is  the  way 
we  ought  to  work  if  we  would  find  all  that  mod- 
ern opportunities  mean  for  us  individually — 
"Work  in  any  place  we  are  put  and  do  all  that  a 
woman  can  do."  But  not  restlessly,  strenuously. 

The  truest  and  best  philanthropic  work  tends 
to  broaden  the  sympathy  and  widen  the  concep- 
tion, if  not  of  the  brotherhood  of  man,  at  least 
of  the  sisterhood  of  woman.  There  is  really 
no  end  to  it — this  question  of  what  women  may 
accomplish  for  the  public  good.  And  one  of  the 
most  hopeful  signs  of  this  close  of  the  nineteenth 
century  is  that  women  are  no  longer  content  with 
hiding  their  light  under  a  bushel.  They  think 
very  little  about  the  position  of  the  light,  so  that 
it  is  shedding  bright  rays  over  the  dark  places 
of  the  earth. 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

There  is  still  here  and  there  a  woman  who 
feels  that  she  is  of  no  value  because  she  has  not 
money  or  some  special  gift.  Let  her  take  heart. 
Whatever  she  is  of  herself,  whatever  she  can 
do  in  the  way  of  personal  service,  is  of  inesti- 
mable value.  There  is  nothing  else  to  compare 
with  it.  Christ  gave  Himself.  It  is  the  highest 
gift,  and  its  noblest  form  is  personal  service  in 
small  things. 


[168] 


XV 

ON  HOME-LOVING  AND  HOUSEKEEPING 

THERE  are  people  in  the  world  in  this  en- 
lightened age  who  are  worrying  about 
the  relation  of  the  woman  of  to-morrow 
to  the  home.  They  argue  that  the  new  woman, 
with  her  opportunities,  her  relation  to  the  busi- 
ness world,  her  college  education,  her  mental  de- 
velopment (which  they  delight  in  referring  to 
as  "so  far  ahead  of  their  physical  develop- 
ment")— that  this  woman  of  the  future  is  sure 
to  cut  asunder  from  all  home  ties;  that  we  are 
to  become  a  race  of  nomads,  who  roam  deso- 
lately from  one  hotel  or  boarding-house  or  lodg- 
ing-house to  another,  with  no  taste  or  desire  for 
the  old-fashioned  home.  But  this  is  now,  as  it 
always  was,  sheer  nonsense.  Ever  since  Eve 
hugged  her  first  baby  to  her  heart  women  have 
been  proud  and  happy  mothers.  Ever  since  she 
urged  Adam  to  partake  of  the  fateful  apple 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

woman  has  been  enticing  man  with  dinners,  good 
or  bad.  Think  you  that  after  thousands  of  years 
we  are  going  to  change  our  natures  entirely  be- 
cause of  a  little  college  training,  a  little  "ad- 
vanced thought"?  Not  while  women  are 
women. 

Woman's  life  for  centuries  has  been  narrowed 
to  a  compass  bounded  by  four  walls;  it  is  true 
that  she  has  now  stepped  out  and  demonstrated 
her  fitness  to  do  her  part  of  the  work  beyond 
those  confines.  She  has  learned  the  beauty  and 
usefulness  of  association,  the  part  that  sustains 
the  great  whole.  She  has  found  out  the  mean- 
ing of  the  word  "coordination"  and  the  beauty 
of  community  work.  She  knows  how  to  make 
the  right  connection  between  home  life  and 
world  interests,  and  her  family  are  the  better 
therefor.  She  realizes  what  relation  a  good 
home  bears  to  the  good  school,  the  influential 
church  and  pure  society.  She  even  begins  to 
comprehend  the  immense  bearing  a  good  home 
and  an  upright  community  have  upon  a  healthy 
industrial  system. 

I  suppose  I  am  optimistic,  but  it  seems  to  me 
that  things  are  going  very  well  for  our  sex  and 
that  we  have  very  little  to  complain  of;  also, 


ON  PUBLIC   DUTIES 

that  the  opposite  sex  has  very  little  to  complain 
of  as  well,  for  he  is  still  far  from  a  buttonless 
state,  and  he  acts  as  if  he  enjoyed  having  intelli- 
gent companionship  from  or  with  his  women- 
kind.  Few  women  are  yet  so  "advanced"  as  to 
wish  to  bring  up  their  babies  on  the  cooperative 
plan.  Many  young  women  persist  in  getting 
married  every  year,  and  also  in  having  babies. 
And  what  do  they  do  about  it  ?  In  the  beginning 
they  pin  a  little  band  around  them  and  see  that 
their  milk  is  maternally  sweet,  and  look  confi- 
dently to  God  for  the  rest.  And  so  far  as  we 
can  judge,  they  seem  to  enjoy  motherhood.  Oh, 
I  know  it  is  the  fashion  to  cry  out  "race  suicide," 
and  all  that,  but  let  us  not  take  to  heart  too  seri- 
ously the  dismal  state  of  affairs  bewailed  by  cer- 
tain sensational  reformers.  For  the  world  is 
rolling  on  towards  the  good — still  swinging  out 
to  the  light. 

The  most  enduring  element  of  our  national 
strength  lies  in  the  fact  that  our  American  life 
centres  around  the  home  fireside.  We  are  proud 
to  boast  of  the  goodness  and  bravery  of  our  men, 
the  beauty  and  purity  of  our  women,  and  they 
have  these  qualities  because  the  home  is  their 
school  and  the  mother  their  teacher.  The  wise 

[171] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

Creator,  when  He  made  woman,  gave  her  the 
two  highest  offices  in  His  gift — those  of  wife  and 
mother.  Kings  boast  of  reigning  by  right  divine, 
and  inscribe  "Rex  Dei  Gratia"  upon  the  laws  of 
their  land,  but  woman  is  the  only  creature  who 
may  truthfully  use  those  words,  and  she  may 
say,  "I  am  a  woman  by  the  grace  of  God,  and 
rule  in  a  kingdom  of  kingdoms."  She  makes  no 
laws,  leads  no  armies,  governs  no  enterprises,  but 
she  forms  those  by  whom  laws  are  made,  armies 
led,  great  enterprises  managed.  I  often  think 
the  wife  and  mother  who  lives  quietly  at  home 
and  looks  well  to  the  ways  of  her  household; 
who  still  pursues  the  simple  art  of  making  her 
husband  happy  ( I  trust  I  do  not  misuse  the  word 
"simple")  and  of  bringing  up  her  children  to 
be  good  citizens — I  often  think  that  this  woman 
feels  that  her  life  is  wasted.  She  reads  and  hears 
of  the  public  work  of  women,  and  sighs  that  her 
life  is  being  thrown  away.  Not  so.  This  woman 
is  fulfilling  the  mission  of  her  being,  and  the 
old-fashioned  wife  and  mother  will  not  go  out 
of  fashion  as  long  as  the  world  stands.  Neither 
do  those  of  us  who  do  not  happen  to  be  wives 
and  mothers  do  right  in  belittling  their  work 
and  arrogating  unto  ourselves  all  the  glory.  I 

[172] 


ON  HOUSEKEEPING 

have  never  known  a  more  splendidly  developed 
woman,  spiritually  and  intellectually,  than  my 
mother ;  and  I  have  chanced  to  know  most  of  the 
prominent  women  of  the  last  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury. And  I  cannot  go  back  on  her  work,  al- 
though had  the  Lord  seen  fit  to  place  her  in  the 
ranks  of  the  care-free,  or  in  the  present  day  and 
generation,  she  would  have  gained  far  wider 
recognition. 

Collectively,  women  may  have  been  weak, 
mistakenly  zealous,  or  wofully  deficient  in 
method,  but  in  this  modern  association  of  all 
grades  in  society  they  are  coming  to  know  them- 
selves and  their  possibilities  as  well  as  their  limi- 
tations. And  they  are  beginning  to  realize  that 
collectively  they  are  only  beginning  their  edu- 
cation. 

The  men  and  women  who  by  their  lives  have 
influenced  the  world,  have  been  those  who  lived 
simple,  earnest,  honest  lives.  What  was  it  that 
endeared  the  late  Queen  of  England  to  her  hum- 
ble subjects?  It  was  her  interest  and  participa- 
tion in  the  common  things  of  everyday  life.  Her 
love  of  children,  tenderness  toward  animals,  even 
her  relish  for  oatmeal  porridge  was  a  virtue  in 
their  eyes.  The  homes  of  the  nation  mean  the 

[173] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

life  of  the  nation.  No  stream  can  rise  higher 
than  its  fountain,  and  as  we  build  our  homes  so 
our  land  will  prosper.  God  has  given  us  a  pic- 
ture of  what  Heaven  may  be,  and  He  has  given 
it  in  the  shape  of  a  perfect  home.  When  we 
learn  to  give  our  girls  the  training  for  home  life 
which  will  give  them  such  power  over  their  work 
that  each  day's  tasks  will  come  to  willing  and 
able  hands,  then  we  shall  have  solved  many  of 
the  problems  that  confront  us  at  the  beginning 
of  this  twentieth  century.  And  right  here,  al- 
though it  may  not  seem  apropos,  how  many 
mothers  are  educating  their  sons  in  the  matter 
of  newspaper  reading?  How  many  wives  say 
to  the  husband  who  brings  home  a  pink  or  a 
yellow  or  a  green,  or  even  some  of  the  white 
newspapers,  "Please  do  not  bring  such  papers 
home  for  the  children  to  read"?  Some  women 
do  this,  it  is  true,  but  more  are  utterly  thought- 
less about  it.  Hosts  of  good  women  read  the 
sensational  papers  themselves — because,  per- 
chance they  cost  only  a  cent,  while  perhaps  the 
better  ones  cost  two;  and  hosts  of  others  allow 
their  children  to  read  the  sensational,  unreliable 
paper  without  ever  giving  a  thought  to  the  fact 
that  those  young,  eager  minds  are  being  sub- 

[174] 


ON  HOUSEKEEPING 

jected  to  a  lowering  of  taste  and  a  lowering  of 
moral  and  mental  tone.  They  are  particular 
about  the  associates  their  children  select;  they 
are  even  particular  about  the  books  they  read; 
but  a  newspaper  is  an  ephemeral  thing,  read  to- 
day and  forgotten  to-morrow,  and  it  does  not 
occur  to  them  that  the  effect  upon  the  child's 
taste  is  morally  and  intellectually  the  same  as  if 
they  were  allowed  to  come  under  the  influence 
of  a  teacher  with  low  morals. 

I  say  this  because  the  modern  newspaper  has 
a  direct  influence  on  the  home  and  the  people 
that  dwell  therein.  The  woman  who  used  to 
spend  her  evenings  picking  out  the  rules  for  cro- 
cheting a  cushion  cover  from  the  woman's  page 
has  learned  how  to  read  good  books,  to  write 
papers  without  a  too  free  use  of  the  encyclopedia, 
how  to  use  her  brains,  how  to  think.  Just  as 
the  woman  who  used  to  edit  the  page  has  come 
into  her  own  and  convinced  the  editor  that  wom- 
en's whole  existence  is  not  bounded  on  the  north 
by  angel  cake,  on  the  east  by  baby's  afghans, 
on  the  south  by  her  pet  dog,  and  on  the  west  by 
her  husband's  dinner;  and  that  the  magnetic 
needle  which  points  her  compass  is  not  a  crochet 
hook.  Women  everywhere  are  learning  that 

[175] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

scientific  or  simplified  housekeeping  is  not  be- 
neath the  attention  of  the  refined  nor  beyond  the 
comprehension  of  the  uncultured.  It  is  the  duty 
of  the  rich  and  the  salvation  of  the  poor.  We 
are  all  agreed  that  as  our  lives  are  now  ordered 
we  have  too  many  things  to  care  for,  too  much 
show  and  too  little  comfort. 

"We  have  exchanged  our  stage  coach  for  the 
electric  motor,  our  tallow  candles  for  the  incan- 
descent light,  and  our  simple  living  for  nervous 
prostration,  so  that  inductive  science,  the  new 
gospel,  must  come  to  our  aid,"  says  a  bright 
woman.  "If  we  would  save  our  bodies  as  well 
as  our  souls,  and  if  the  knowledge  of  household 
economics  means  anything  to  us,  it  means  we 
must  get  back  to  nature's  heart  and  be  content 
to  live  simpler  lives." 

And  we  must  remember  that  for  every  bad 
woman,  every  erratic  woman,  every  cold  and 
selfish  woman  in  the  world,  there  are  a  thousand 
good  and  true  and  faithful  unto  death.  Only 
the  cynic  and  the  critic  do  not  consider  the  latter 
worth  talking  about.  They  only  emphasize  the 
abnormal  woman,  thinking  all  the  time  they  are 
holding  the  mirror  up  to  nature  and  proving 
something;  which  they  are  not. 


ON  HOUSEKEEPING 

Domestic  science  is  domestic  sense,  and  do- 
mestic sense  is  common  sense.  Women  should 
have  the  best  and  highest  education  they  can 
obtain,  and  more  especially  if  their  lives  are  to 
be  rounded  out  in  the  limited  bounds  of  a  four- 
room  cottage;  and  while  she  may  have  caught 
the  spirit  of  the  times  and  become  an  expansion- 
ist by  invading  new  territories,  and  may  have 
been  masquerading  as  the  "eternal  feminine"  or 
the  "new  woman,"  these  little  excursions  and  di- 
versions only  make  her  prize  the  more  her  old 
dominion,  and  the  complexities  of  her  nature  find 
full  play  in  the  evolutions  in  the  American 
home. 

Statistics  have  already  proved  that  the  college- 
bred  woman  marries  in  the  same  proportion  and 
infinitely  better  than  the  simpering  sister  who 
cares  nothing  for  education.  And  she  not  only 
has  as  many  children,  but  is  manifestly  better 
fitted  to  train  them  up  to  good  citizenship.  It 
is  also  evident  that  woman's  experience  in  the 
business  world — while  it  makes  her  more  cau- 
tious about  marriage — renders  her  a  more  sym- 
pathetic, appreciative  and  sensible  wife  than  the 
girl  who  waits  at  home  for  a  husband,  who,  she 
has  been  taught  to  believe,  must  ever  after  be 
[177] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

her  body-slave.  And  although  modern  condi- 
tions make  it  possible  for  a  woman  to  be  self- 
supporting,  and  therefore  not  to  marry  unless  she 
does  it  for  that  greatest  reason  in  the  world — 
love — the  business  of  marrying  and  having  chil- 
dren is  going  right  on,  age  after  age,  generation 
after  generation,  long  after  you  and  I  are  forgot- 
ten. So  there  is  no  real  cause  for  worry.  Even 
the  rankest  pessimist  may  take  heart  if  he  will. 
And  to  all  I  commend  the  lamented  Frank  N  or- 
ris' definition  of  a  "womanly  woman,"  a  term 
we  all  love  to  use : 

"To  be  womanly?  It's  to  be  kind  and  well- 
bred  and  gentle  mostly,  and  never  to  be  bold  or 
conspicuous;  and  to  love  one's  home  and  take 
care  of  it,  and  to  love  and  believe  in  one's  hus- 
band, or  parents,  or  children,  or  even  one's  sis- 
ter, above  any  one  else  in  the  world." 


XVI 

ON  GROWING  OLD 

IT  is  often  said  that  we  have  no  old  women 
nowadays,  that  modern  conditions  and 
modern  dress  keep  us  young  until  we  drop 
into  our  graves.  And  when  we  look  at  women, 
marvelous  women,  indeed,  like  Julia  Ward 
Howe  and  Susan  B.  Anthony,  and  Mary  A. 
Livermore*  and  others  whose  activities  and  ben- 
eficences have  kept  them  young,  we  are  inclined 
to  believe  all  this.  But  how  is  it  with  the  most 
of  us?  Have  we  learned  the  true  art  of  "grow- 
ing old  gracefully"  ?  In  this  age  of  hurry- 
scurry  let  us  give  ourselves  pause,  once  in  awhile, 
long  enough  to  remember  that  we  owe  ourselves 
something,  and  also  those  around  us.  I  know 
a  woman  who  broke  down  under  the  strain  of 
club  life  a  few  years  ago;  she  was  one  of  those 
willing  creatures  who  do  everything  anybody 
asks  of  them,  and  she  finally  had  to  withdraw 

*  Died  since  this  was  put  in  type. 

[179] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

from  everything  and  remain  in  quiet  seclusion 
for  some  years.  I  thought  she  had  learned  her 
lesson,  but  no.  I  met  her  again,  almost  breath- 
less in  her  chase  about  the  city  on  some  mission 
or  other. 

"Why  do  you  do  it?"  I  asked.  "You  have 
broken  down  once  under  the  strain  of  all  this  ex- 
citement. Why  don't  you  keep  out  of  it  now? 
Or,  if  you  must  be  in  the  midst  of  things  again, 
why  not  let  others  do  the  hard  work?" 

"Oh,"  she  replied,  "I  must  do  it.  It  has  got 
to  be  done,  and  who  else  will  do  it?" 

"My  dear,  good  friend,"  I  asked  her,  "did 
you  ever  stop  to  ask  yourself  what  would  happen 
if  you  and  I  were  to  die?" 

"Oh,"  she  exclaimed  hurriedly,  "nobody  else 
will  do  my  work;  and  it  is  very  important — I 
really  have  to  do  it." 

"No,  you  don't  have  to,"  I  answered.  "If 
we  were  to  die  to-night  the  waters  would  close 
right  over  our  heads,  and  after  saying  the  con- 
ventional things  about  us,  and  passing  suitable 
votes  of  condolence,  somebody  else  would  take 
up  our  particular  line  of  work;  these  things  we 
think  nobody  else  could  possibly  do  so  well  would 
get  done  just  as  quickly  and  possibly  a  great  deal 
[180] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

better  than  if  you  and  I  kept  wearing  ourselves 
out  with  them.    You  just  try  it  and  see." 

She  thought  a  moment  and  said:  "You  are 
right.  I  know  you  are  right,  and  I  am  going 
to  stop  now." 

But  she  didn't.  And  I  suppose  she  will  keep 
on,  strong  in  the  belief  that  the  work  she  is  do- 
ing could  not  possibly  be  done  if  she  did  not 
wear  herself  out  with  it,  until  she  lands  in  a 
sanitarium  again  with  nervous  prostration.  I 
see  her  now  and  then,  always  daintily  dressed, 
always  refined  and  delicate-looking,  but  with  a 
wild  air,  a  restless,  hunted  look,  when  she  might 
be  so  pretty  and  attractive. 

Are  we  not  all  overdoing  this  matter  of  public 
work?  I  have  done  my  share  of  burning  the 
candle  at  both  ends — yes,  and  in  the  middle,  too 
— and  have  had  to  "give  myself  pause."  And 
I  have  come  to  see  that  there  is  nothing  to  be 
gained  by  hurrying  through  life  without  a  mo- 
ment's stop  to  consider  the  real  meaning  of  it. 
It  is  sometimes  a  difficult  thing  to  be  in  the  midst 
of  much  work  without  overdoing.  There  is 
scarcely  time  enough  to  accomplish  half  what 
one  sets  out  to  do,  is  there  ?  Then  do  not  map 
out  so  much,  but  try  to  do  your  "stint"  more 
[181] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

leisurely.  What  is  to  be  gained  by  rushing 
through  life  as  though  a  whirlwind  were  on  our 
path? 

We  get  to  a  point  where  we  feel  ourselves  so 
necessary.  We  find  so  many  things  that  need 
to  be  done,  and  we  are  sure  nobody  else  can  do 
them  so  well  as  we.  And  so  we  go  on  straining 
every  nerve  until  the  tension  becomes  too  great, 
and  we  either  go  under — and  discover  that  the 
world  can  and  does  move  just  as  well  without 
us — or  we  become  so  arbitrary  that  our  useful- 
ness is  ended.  And  then  we  discover  that  we  are 
only  one  of  many  just  as  capable  as  ourselves. 

I  know  of  no  one  who  has  given  better  advice 
on  this  subject  than  Caroline  Bartlett  Crane,  who 
also  "speaks  whereof  she  knows."  In  talking 
once  on  the  subject  of  overwork,  she  said: 

"If  we  will  not  be  forewarned  against  over- 
work, let  us  at  least  be  certain  that  what  goes 
by  that  name  is  the  real  thing.  Above  all,  dear 
ladies,  let  us  not  make  our  lives  vain,  vain- 
glorious and  in  vain,  by  fancying  that  all  busy- 
ness is  business;  by  hugging  a  merely  cluttered 
existence  with  ecstatic  and  debilitating  self- 
consciousness,  which  is  one  of  the  deadliest  banes 
to  be  guarded  against  as  long  as  'woman's  work,7 
[182] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

'woman's  mission,'  'woman's  institutions'  and  the 
'woman  question'  agitate  the  air.  Let  us  strive 
for  more  of  that  poise  which  experience  and  a 
stable  nervous  organization  has  given  men;  let 
us  remember  that  there  are  absolutely  no  safe- 
guards against  fussing  and  worry;  and  let  us 
question  whether,  if  the  deeps  of  nervous  pros- 
tration could  give  up  its  half  dead,  it  would  not 
thereby  appear  that  lack  of  system  and  synthesis 
in  what  we  do,  apprehensions  for  what  we  are 
about  to  do,  regrets  for  what  we  did  or  did  not 
do,  omnivorous  yearning  for  what  we  have  no 
call  to  do,  fretting  distaste  for  what  fate  ordains 
we  shall  do,  doing  all  the  little  unimportant 
things  first  under  the  delusion  that  then  we  will 
get  unencumbered  leisure  for  the  things  really 
worth  while,  doing  things  a  hundred  times  in 
imagination  before  they  are  done,  and  doing 
them  as  many  times  again  in  retrospect,  with 
carking  concern  for  how  the  doer  appears  in  the 
doing — let  us  ask  ourselves  if  such  travesties 
upon  the  dignity  and  simplicity,  the  singleness 
and  wholesomeness  of  real  work  are  not  respon- 
sible for  a  very  considerable  share  of  the  evils 
we  commonly  lay  at  the  door  of  overwork ;  and 
are  not  such  things  unworthy  of  us? 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

"Let  us  strive  to  realize  that  we  influence 
more  by  what  we  are  than  by  what  we  do  or 
what  we  say;  and  that  what  we  say  and  do  de- 
rives its  quality  from  our  quality.  And  quality 
is  felt  in  toto,  while  of  quantity  a  census  and  ap- 
praisal must  needs  be  made. 

"And  let  us  remember,  too,  that  when  we  rob 
a  day  of  order,  beauty,  peace,  we  rob  life  of  these 
things.  How  can  we  live  our  days  one  way  and 
talk  of  living  our  lives  another  way?  'As  thy 
days  so  shall  thy  strength  be.'  We  must  live 
so  as  to  praise  God  all  the  days  of  our  lives,  if 
we  would  praise  Him.  Let  us  find  some  time 
in  every  day  to  lift  unencumbered  hands  and 
heart,  and  exclaim  with  the  psalmist,  'This  is 
the  day  which  the  Lord  hath  made ;  we  will  re- 
joice and  be  glad  in  it.'  ' 

It  rests  with  us  and  no  one  else  to  strike  the 
notes  that  give  the  purest  melody.  There  is  the 
life  of  pretence,  with  its  artificial  standards,  and 
the  life  of  honest  endeavor,  where  every  note 
rings  true;  in  other  words,  a  whole  world  of 
real  people,  where  each  man  and  each  woman  is 
measured  by  their  own  true  work,  where  friend- 
ships are  honest,  where  laughs  are  hearty  and 
tears  are  real,  where  lives  are  happiest  because 
[184] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

they  are  lived  simplest,  where  the  air  is  pure  and 
the  clothes  you  wear  do  not  signify. 

Then,  too,  think  what  trouble  might  be 
avoided  if  we  only  mastered  the  power  of  silence. 
Especially  is  this  true  when  some  controversy 
arises.  It  is  hard  indeed  to  be  at  all  interested 
in  and  to  sit  still  when  a  heated  discussion  is  on, 
But  it  is  a  good  discipline.  Next  time  just  shut 
your  teeth  together  and  say  to  yourself,  "After 
all,  what  does  it  matter?"  You  will  soon  find 
that  other  people  are  doing  all  the  quarreling. 
It  is  wonderful  how  small  a  compass  many  con- 
troversies can  be  crowded  into  when  you  really 
stop  to  consider  how  much  of  them  are  worth 
while. 

We  all  know  how  impossible  it  is  to  do  our 
best  in  the  home  if  we  have  to  live  in  the  spirit 
of  criticism.  If  there  is  some  one  in  the  family 
whom  it  is  impossible  to  please,  who  stands  ready 
to  ascribe  to  us  motives  unworthy  of  any  good 
woman,  and  to  deny  that  we  have  anything  but 
self-seeking  and  selfishness  behind  all  our  ac- 
tions, it  becomes  impossible  for  us  to  live  out 
the  best  that  is  in  us,  or  to  keep  anger  and  jeal- 
ousy and  suspicion  out  of  our  own  hearts,  after 
a  time  at  least.  Few  women  there  are  but  know 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

or  have  known  what  it  means  to  have  such  an 
element  somewhere  in  the  family  connections. 
But,  even  if  some  one  says  hard  things  about 
you,  the  most  powerful  weapon  is  silence.  The 
most  contemptuous  or  stinging  retort  has  not  the 
force  nor  the  strength  of  simply  saying  nothing. 
For  there  is  nothing  which  you  could  say  that 
is  so  hard  on  your  adversary  as  to  ignore  her 
argument. 

Vanity  enters  so  largely  into  the  make-up  of 
most  mortals  that  it  must  be  recognized.  When 
a  gossip  brings  a  tale  about  some  friend,  there 
is  no  rebuke  so  keenly  felt  as  a  dignified  and 
sober  silence.  When  such  a  story  is  brought  and 
you  ask  some  question,  or  even  seem  to  acqui- 
esce, you  are  pretty  sure  to  be  reported  as  hav- 
ing told  the  story.  We  all  have  days,  too,  which 
seem  to  be  filled  with  petty  trials  and  miserable 
crosses.  The  woman  at  home  as  well  as  the  man 
in  business  has  to  bear  these  until  every  nerve 
seems  bare.  Small  things  assume  huge  propor- 
tions, and  life  seems  almost  unendurable.  We 
cannot  see  a  bit  beyond  the  little  circle  of  our 
trials,  and  discouragements  loom  large  on  our 
horizon.  Nothing  is  right  simply  because  we 
are  not  right. 

[186] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

Do  not  give  way  to  ill-temper  and  snap  up 
those  around  you.  Go  where  you  can  be  alone 
— out-of-doors  if  possible;  if  not,  in  a  room  by 
yourself.  Say  a  little  prayer.  Relax  your  mus- 
cles. Think  of  the  country,  the  mountains,  the 
sea,  a  starry  night — anything  but  your  troubles. 
Stay  in  the  silence  fifteen  minutes.  There  is  won- 
derful magic  in  it. 

"Bear  ye  one  another's  burdens"  may  mean 
much,  but  there  is  a  far  greater  nobility  in  si- 
lently bearing  your  own.  One  need  not  be  un- 
friendly nor  unsocial,  but  one  should  cultivate 
the  power  of  silence  and  the  habit  of  silence.  If 
you  do  not  read  another  book  get  into  the  habit 
of  reading  daily  bits  from  Miss  Call's  "The 
Power  of  Silence,"  and  her  "As  a  Matter  of 
Course,"  and  Lida  Churchill's  "The  Magic 
Seven."  These  preach  the  gospel  of  relaxation 
which,  translated,  means  the  habit  of  not  caring. 
That  man  succeeds  best  who  flings  his  soul  into 
his  life-work  and  does  his  level  best,  and  then 
does  not  sit  up  nights  worrying  over  the  result. 
Throw  off  your  cares  and  anxieties.  Drop 
everything  and  go  out-of-doors.  You  remember 
what  the  immortal  Samantha  Allen  said  about 
worrying  at  nights?  "Why,  how  often  have  I 

' 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

laid  for  hours  worrying  about  things  and  made 
'em  out  like  mountains,  only  to  see  'em  drop 
off  and  fade  away  by  the  morning  light,  dwin- 
dlin'  down  to  mere  nothin's."  We  have  all  been 
there.  If  we  could  live  over  again,  now,  all  the 
time  we  have  spent  in  fruitless  worrying,  in  sleep- 
less nights,  we  should  have  several  years  added 
to  our  three  score  and  ten.  Worry  means  always 
and  invariably  inhibition  of  associations  and  loss 
of  effective  power.  The  sovereign  cure  for 
worry  is  faith — religious  faith,  or,  if  you  prefer 
to  call  it  so,  optimism ;  perhaps  it  all  amounts  to 
the  same  thing.  The  turbulent  billows  of  the 
fretful  surface  leave  the  deep  parts  of  the  ocean 
undisturbed,  and  to  her  who  has  a  hold  on  vaster 
and  more  permanent  realities,  the  hourly  vicissi- 
tudes of  personal  destiny  seem  relatively  insig- 
nificant. Whether  one  is  really  a  "professor  of 
religion"  or  not,  the  really  religious  person  is 
that  one  who  is  unshakable  and  full  of  equa- 
nimity and  calmly  ready  for  anything  that  may 
come. 

As  the  psychologist  would  tell  us,  if  we  wish 

our  trains  of  ideation  and  volition  to  be  copious 

and  effective,  we  must  form  the  habit  of  freeing 

them  from  the  inhibitive  influence  of  egoistic 

[188] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

preoccupation  about  results;  and  such  a  habit  can 
be  formed  if  we  will  set  ourselves  to  doing  it. 
Prudence  and  duty  and  ambition  and  self-regard 
have  their  places  in  our  lives  and  we  need  not 
banish  them,  but  do  not  let  them  interfere  with 
our  real  selves.  In  other  words,  when  we  have 
decided  on  a  plan  of  action,  stick  to  it  and  do  not 
worry  about  the  outcome.  Unclamp  your  men- 
tal machinery  and  let  it  go  without  fret  or  worry. 
It  is  the  people  who  fling  worry  to  the  winds  and 
keep  up  their  nervous  tone  that  succeed.  All 
of  which  is  applicable  to  growing  old,  even 
if  you  do  think  I  have  wandered  from  my 
subject. 

Women  have  been  too  long  trained  to  the  need 
of  feeling  responsible  about  something.  Some 
women  cannot  buy  a  paper  of  pins  without  a 
long  argument  with  themselves  as  to  whether 
they  shall  be  sharp-pointed  or  blunt.  Most  of 
us  fritter  away  our  strength  in  useless  fussing 
over  nothing  at  some  time  in  our  day.  What 
we  need  is  the  toning  down  of  our  moral  and 
mental  tensions. 

Some  women,  a  few,  are  born  with  the  gift  of 
self-poise;  others  acquire  it,  and  many  never 
know  the  meaning  of  the  word;  but  self-poise 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

is  never  thrust  upon  any  of  us.  What  a  com- 
fortable sister  she  is  who  has  it.  How  safe  and 
happy  we  are  in  her  presence.  For  she  looks 
upon  life  calmly  and  with  such  a  large  vision 
that  we  forget  how  great  the  petty  affairs  of 
everyday  living  had  loomed  on  our  horizon  be- 
fore we  came  to  know  her.  She  has  learned  to 
close  her  eyes  to  such  unpleasant  things  as  can- 
not be  helped  and  to  smooth  away  those  that  can ; 
she  closes  her  ears  to  words  that  insidiously  steal 
away  one's  peace  of  mind  and  to  utter  the  soft 
words  that  turn  away  wrath.  Outside  influences 
are  never  allowed  to  canker  or  to  disturb 
the  serenity  of  her  soul;  and,  if  she  is  a  house- 
keeper, her  family  are  allowed  to  dwell  in  com- 
fort. In  other  words,  she  is  not  the  kind  of 
woman  who  chases  through  life  with  a  dust-cloth 
in  one  hand  and  a  fly-killer  in  the  other,  and  a 
poorly  swept  room  or  a  spot  on  the  tablecloth  at 
breakfast  table  are  not  the  excuse  for  making 
the  whole  family  miserable  for  the  day.  So 
many  women  seem  to  think  that  anything 
that  causes  them  uneasiness  to  them  is  suffi- 
cient cause  for  making  everybody  else  around 
them  unhappy. 

She  has  the  secret  of  "how  to  grow  old  grace- 
[190] 


ON   GROWING   OLD 

fully,"  and  there  is  no  better  nor  surer  way  to 
avoid  wrinkles  than  to  keep  out  of  one's  life  and 
heart  the  demon  of  worry.  If  you  choose, 
you  may  call  this  power  an  oil  that  makes 
the  machinery  of  life  run  smoothly  and  noise- 
lessly. I  call  it  living  on  a  plane  where  the 
mire  of  petty  smallness,  the  hurt  of  wrong  liv- 
ing and  the  danger  of  wrong  thinking  cannot 
reach  us. 

But,  after  all,  why  should  we  dread  growing 
old?  It  seems  to  me  that  life  should  be  bright- 
est, like  the  sunset,  just  before  the  night — if  it 
is  night.  I  prefer  to  think  of  it  as  the  real  morn- 
ing. When  we  have  learned  to  drop  worry  and 
undue  haste,  and  fretfulness  and  all  disagree- 
ableness,  we  are  only  just  fitted  to  enjoy  the  se- 
renity of  age.  Let's  stop  right  here  with 
Hamilton  Aide's  comforting  verses  on  "Old 
Age." 

"There  comes  a  time  when  nothing  more  can 

hurt  us. 
The  winds  have  done  their  worst  to  strew  the 

shore 

With  stranded  hulks;  no  power  can  convert  us 
Into  the  buoyant  barks  of  youth  once  more. 

[190  ' 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

uBut  we  can  sit  and  patch  the  sails  for  others, 
And  weave  the  nets  for  younger  hands  to 

trawl ; 
And   spin    long   yarns    to   listening   boys    and 

mothers, 
While  sea  and  winds  do  one  another  call ; 

"And  point  to  perils,  when  our  bark  lay  tossing 

In  that  dread  passage  which  we  here  call  Life, 

And  betwixt  shoals  and  rocks  we  steered  our 

crossing 

Unto  the  shore,  where  we  have  done  with 
strife. 

"From  seas  tumultuous  the  sands  have  barred  it; 

From  there  we  watch  the  white  sails  fleet- 
ing by. 
Old  age  is  never  drear,  if  we  regard  it 

As  the  safe  harbor  where  the  old  boats  lie." 


[192] 


XVII 

ON  THE   OUTLOOK 

WHAT,  then,  of  the  woman  of  to-mor- 
row?    What  part  will  she  play  in 
affairs  of  public  interest?    What  will 
she  do  with  the  home?    What  will  she  do  and 
be  as  an  individual? 

As  I  write,  the  robins  and  orioles  and  bobo- 
links are  singing  around  the  house,  out  in  the 
orchard.  Mingled  with  their  notes  comes  the 
strain  of  a  catbird,  the  "northern  mocking-bird." 
They  are  all  beautiful,  and  combine  to  make  a 
perfect  harmony  of  music  in  the  May  sunshine ; 
but  it  is  the  catbird's  song  that  the  ear  strains 
to  follow,  with  its  sweet  and  sudden  changes, 
its  low  guttural  notes  and  its  pure,  uplifted  tones 
as  it  tries  to  catch  and  mimic  the  strain  of  the 
bluebird,  the  thrush,  the  oriole.  And  I  willingly 
forget  the  others  in  trying  to  keep  count  of  her 
bewitching  changes.  And  I  wonder  if  it  does 

[193] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

not  typify  the  modern  woman.  The  others, 
lovely,  melodious  little  creatures,  are  woman  as 
she  has  been  for  years,  woman  of  whom  we  know 
what  to  expect.  But  the  catbird !  Here  we  have 
the  woman  of  to-day  outdoing  all  the  others, 
catching  their  song,  putting  forth  all  their  capti- 
vating graces,  and  making  herself  heard  and  felt 
wherever  she  goes.  It  is  the  unexpectedness  of 
her  song,  the  spontaneous  uncertainty  of  it  com- 
bined with  the  knowledge  that  it  will  be  well 
worth  listening  to,  that  holds  us  captive,  as  with 
strained  ear  we  watch  for  what  she  will  do  next. 
And  if  she  puts  forth  guttural  or  harsh  notes 
now  and  again  we  can  forgive  and  forget  them 
for  the  sake  of  the  sweet,  entrancing  ones  that 
we  know  are  sure  to  follow. 

It  is  so  with  the  work  woman  is  doing  outside 
of  the  home.  She  is  doing  everything  and  do- 
ing it  in  her  own  way,  imitative,  perhaps,  but 
still  so  different  from  men's  way  or  from  her 
sisters  of  the  day  before  yesterday  as  to  render 
her  and  her  methods  always  an  object  of  interest. 
She  is  establishing  libraries,  improving  streets 
and  villages  and  municipalities,  raising  the  stand- 
ard of  education,  fighting  against  oppression  in 
the  form  of  sweatshops  and  child  labor,  and  get- 
[194] 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

ting  bills  introduced  to  legislative  bodies — and 
still  she  is  the  same  captivating,  lovable  and 
loving  woman  as  of  yore.  We  flatter  ourselves 
that  women  have  done  a  great  deal  for  the  pub- 
lic good,  but  fifty  years  hence  shall  we  not  look 
back  at  our  achievements  of  to-day  as  the  merest 
beginnings — a  thing  of  shreds  and  patches? 
For  so  long  as  the  world  stands  its  women  are 
going  to  do  their  best  to  uplift  humanity.  They 
have  found  out  that  the  mere  stayer  at  home, 
content  with  the  Laissez  faire  of  other  days, 
helps  only  those  in  her  immediate  circle  (let  us 
hope  she  always  does  that !) .  To-day  the  woman 
who  helps  reaches  across  the  State  with  her  li- 
braries and  her  child-labor  bills;  even  clear 
across  the  continent  is  modern  associated  woman- 
hood stretching  her  influence.  The  women  of 
Massachusetts  send  books  and  money  to  estab- 
lish schools  in  Georgia;  the  women  of  Minne- 
sota and  Michigan  scatter  literature  and  manual 
training  across  the  plains  of  Arizona.  If  the 
woman  of  to-day  cannot  go  over  into  Mesopo- 
tamia in  person,  she  can  send  the  cheering  word, 
the  helpful  dollar,  the  influence  of  thousands  of 
good  women  across  the  intervening  spaces.  It 
is  the  sisterhood  of  women  awakening  to  a  sense 

[195] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  what  humanity  requires  of  them.  And  when 
this  is  fully  awakened  the  way  is  made  clear  for 
the  woman  of  to-morrow;  a  way  she  is  sure  to 
follow  and  will,  and  make  to  blossom  as  the  rose 
while  she  is  about  it. 

But  while  she  extends  her  work  out  and  be- 
yond she  will  not  forget  the  home.  Let  extrem- 
ists advise  as  they  will,  they  can  never  make  the 
ordinary,  home-loving  woman,  born  with  all  the 
primal  instincts  of  womanhood,  believe  that  in 
fulfilling  her  natural  duties  as  wife  and  mother 
and  daughter  and  teacher  she  is  wasting  her  life 
in  drudgery.  The  woman  of  to-morrow  will  fall 
in  love  and  marry  and  have  children  just  as  the 
woman  of  yesterday  did;  only  let  us  hope  she 
will  be  more  careful  about  whom  she  falls  in  love 
with,  at  what  age  she  marries  and  how  she  brings 
up  her  children.  In  this  time  of  steam-driven 
spindles,  cutting  and  sewing  machines  and  the 
general  lightening  of  labor,  more  leisure  comes 
to  the  average  woman  which  she  will  not  be  con- 
tent to  fill  with  mere  selfish  or  social  pleasures. 
She  will  wake  to  the  knowledge  of  how  to  use 
her  time  most  wisely.  With  greater  leisure 
and  greater  wealth  and  comfort  we  may  expect 
more  and  not  less  of  the  sharing  with  others  of 


ON   THE    OUTLOOK 

the  best  we  have.  Great  economic  changes  are 
taking  place  in  the  home  life.  The  family,  at 
one  time  almost  a  self-sufficient  economic  unit, 
now  satisfies  fewer  and  fewer  direct  economic 
wants.  It  is  not  so  many  years  since  there  were 
well-to-do  New  England  families  in  rural  dis- 
tricts which  did  not  spend  fifty  dollars  a  year 
for  the  satisfaction  of  family  wants.  They  pro- 
duced everything  themselves,  raised  and  pre- 
pared for  use  all  their  food  supply,  even  the  ma- 
terials for  clothing,  the  tools  for  their  work,  the 
furniture  for  their  homes,  and  they  provided 
within  themselves  all  the  essential  services  for 
the  social  and  educational  life  of  the  home.  All 
is  different  now,  even  in  the  most  primitive  rural 
districts.  The  farmer  buys  all  his  clothing,  no 
longer  makes  his  shoes  or  clothes,  buys  a  large 
part  of  his  food  supply,  even  many  of  the  most 
common  farm  products,  such  as  milk,  butter  and 
eggs.  The  farmer's  wife  buys  her  dresses  and 
children's  clothes  ready-made,  and  too  often  does 
not  bake  her  own  bread  or  pastry.  Laundry 
work  is  given  out,  and  in  many  cases  all  the 
washing  as  well,  and  the  good  Hausfrau  has  no 
longer  an  excuse  for  irritability  on  two  days  of 
the  week.  Ladies'  tailoring  promises  fair  to 

[197] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

eliminate  the  necessity  for  periodical  family  dis- 
turbances caused  by  the  visits  of  the  dressmaker 
and  seamstress.  Is  not  the  increase  of  family 
goods  and  services  not  long  since  provided  within 
the  family  itself,  and  constituting  the  bulk  of  the 
time-consuming  burden  of  the  wife  and  mother 
and  daughters  in  each  individual  home,  but  now 
provided  for  by  organized  effort  outside  the 
home,  really  remarkable?  All  these  economic 
changes  more  directly  affect  the  life  of  women 
than  that  of  men.  And  we  can  but  remark  that 
in  the  resultant  increase  in  leisure,  women  as  a 
class  have  been  relatively  greater  gainers  than 
men,  partly  because  in  the  shifting  of  their  ac- 
tivities somewhat  of  their  economic  productive 
functions  have  been  undertaken  by  men.  It  is  a 
matter  of  congratulation,  however,  that  all  the 
economic  changes  in  the  position  and  work  of 
women  have  been  accompanied  by  the  most  re- 
markable expansion  this  country  has  ever  wit- 
nessed, an  expansion  alongside  of  which  our  po- 
litical expansion  is  a  mere  bagatelle,  an  expan- 
sion in  woman's  educational  interests  and  aspira- 
tions. The  higher  education  and  a  more  diversi- 
fied education  has  brought  woman  inevitably  into 
the  arena  of  public  duties  and  large  social  re- 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

sponsibilities,  and  must  needs  lead  her  to  demand 
a  specific  training  and  equipment  for  social 
service. 

The  day  has  passed  when  Martin  Luther 
could  say:  "No  gown  or  garment  worse  becomes 
a  woman  than  when  she  would  be  wise."  Women 
must  educate  themselves  to-day,  not  merely  for 
their  own  sakes,  but  for  the  sakes  of  others,  for 
whether  they  will  or  not  they  must  educate 
others.  Let  them  keep  high  ideals  and  live  up 
to  them,  for  as  wife  and  mother,  sister  and 
daughter,  an  influence  indirect  and  perhaps  un- 
conscious is  shaping  some  character  and  building 
for  the  weal  or  woe  of  our  country.  Benjamin 
Rush  once  said:  "A  philosopher  decided,  'Let 
me  make  the  ballads  of  a  country  and  I  care  not 
who  makes  its  laws.'  '  He  might  with  more 
propriety  have  said:  "Let  the  ladies  of  a  coun- 
try be  educated  properly  and  they  will  not  only 
make  and  administer  its  laws,  but  form  its  man- 
ners and  character." 

We  have  not  yet  taken  kindly  to  the  earnest 
suggestion  of  the  greatest  philosopher  of  the 
ancient  Greek  world  to  farm  out  our  children 
(more  recently  adapted  by  Mrs.  Stetson-Gil- 
man) ,  nor  is  there  any  monopolistic  combination 
[199] 


THE  WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

for  the  propagation  and  perpetuation  of  the  race. 
Barring  the  increasing  activities  of  the  home  in 
its  care  for  the  welfare  of  its  children,  activities 
increasing  in  importance  and  in  their  demands 
proportionately  with  the  advance  of  civilization, 
find  women  with  more  time  for  the  larger  life 
and  more  inclination  to  learn  how  to  use  it  wisely 
and  effectively.  As  to  the  character  and  kind 
of  this  outside  work,  it  seems  to  me  that  it  will 
be  best  directed  along  these  lines: 

The  promotion  of  public  health  and  sani- 
tation. 

The  protection  of  the  highest  attainable  stand- 
ard or  plane  of  living  for  the  various  classes  in 
society. 

The  attainment  of  a  progressively  better  type 
of  education  for  all,  guaranteeing  a  better  ad- 
justment to  both  our  economic  and  social  environ- 
ment. 

The  enlargement  of  our  sympathies  and  of  our 
general  moral  and  spiritual  outlook  as  expressed 
in  our  ideals  of  conduct  and  life. 

The  housekeeper  of  the  future,  too*,  will  know 
how  to  make  the  best  use  of  her  time  and  under- 
stand how  to  save  her  strength.  She  will  dis- 
criminate between  what  is  necessary  work  and 
[200] 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

what  unnecessary.  It  is  inevitable  that  our  twen- 
tieth century  women  will  make  good  wives. 
They  will  understand  their  husbands'  busi- 
ness and  regulate  their  expenditures  ac- 
cordingly. At  the  table  the  talk  will  not 
be  limited  to  complaints  about  servants  and 
gossip  about  friends  and  neighbors,  but 
topics  of  the  day  will  be  intelligently  dis- 
cussed, and  the  husband  will  receive  the  in- 
telligent cooperation  of  his  wife  in  all  his 
affairs. 

We  are  all  interested  in  public  health  and 
sanitation,  in  the  prevention  of  the  spread  of  dis- 
ease, in  the  lowering  of  the  death  rate,  in  immu- 
nity from  exposure  to  disease,  in  the  protection  of 
the  sources  of  our  water  supply,  of  our  milk  sup- 
ply and  of  the  meat  diet  offered  in  our  markets. 
In  all  of  these  things  women  are  by  nature  and 
experience  better  qualified  to  lead  than  men,  and 
not  until  women  do  undertake  their  full  share  of 
such  social  work  will  our  community  standards 
of  health  and  cleanliness  compare  with  those 
that  woman  has  evolved  in  the  home,  and  will 
those  of  the  home  be  still  further  improved. 
Still,  the  average  workingman's  cottage  to-day 
is  in  a  better  sanitary  condition  than  the  palace 
[201] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  the  rich  was  fifty  years  ago,  and  the  ordinary 
artisan's  family  lives  with  more  consideration  for 
the  rules  of  hygiene.  This  is,  of  course, 
due  to  the  development  of  science,  but  it  is 
also  due  to  the  awakening  of  womankind. 
But  in  no  other  way  is  woman  heir  of  all 
the  ages  in  the  foremost  files  of  time  than 
in  her  motherhood.  With  all  that  child  study 
has  discovered,  with  all  the  experience  of 
her  mother  and  grandmother  to  draw  from, 
with  all  the  discoveries  of  science  at  her 
womanhood,  and  with  a  fuller  sense  of  her  moral 
responsibility  than  ever  before,  good  mothers 
are  inevitable. 

God  designed  women  primarily  to  be  moth- 
ers of  the  race,  and  all  the  talk  of  the  ultra  re- 
former, all  the  cryings  of  pessimists,  will  not 
change  this  unalterable  fact.  In  this  connection 
I  wish  to  second  most  heartily  the  wish  uttered 
recently  by  a  prominent  Western  woman  of  wide 
experience : 

"I  wish  every  childless  home  might  be  filled 
with  homeless  little  children  who  lack  a  father's 
loving  care  and  a  mother's  fond  devotion — that 
immortal  souls  that  are  perishing  in  helplessness, 
want  and  vice  might  be  rescued  and  loved  and 
[202] 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

trained  to  virtue.  On  this  beautiful  earth  there 
should  never  be  a  homeless  child,  there  should 
not  be  so  many  foundlings'  homes  and  orphan 
asylums,  as  beautiful  as  those  charities  are!  The 
most  precious  gift  of  God,  a  fresh  and  innocent 
soul  to  love,  to  rear  and  train  for  usefulness,  is 
not  given  to  every  woman,  but  there  is  none 
among  us  so  busy,  so  burdened  by  care  or  lack 
of  means,  who  would  not  be  the  better  for  such 
an  angel  ministrant  in  her  home,  for  such  a  check 
upon  the  self-absorption  or  selfishness  that  men 
and  women  grow  into  without  the  loving  pranks 
and  clinging  caresses  of  innocent  little  children. 

"Alas!  for  the  starved  heart  of  a  woman  who 
expends  all  her  mother  love  and  tenderness 
upon  a  pampered  pug  or  an  elongated  dachs- 
hund. 

"Alas!  for  the  stifled  soul  who,  for  love  of 
ease,  can  pass  by  unheeding  the  need  of  Christ's 
little  ones  who  are  denied  by  circumstances  the 
right  to  be  well  born  and  well  bred.  How  many 
luxurious  mansions  never  hear  the  music  of  child- 
hood's voices!  How  many  homes  of  compara- 
tive comfort  in  the  middle  classes  never  resound 
with  the  tread  of  childish  feet,  or  know  the  glad- 
ness of  the  trusting  love  of  a  little  child,  sweetest 
[203] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

of  earthly  joy  1  Is  it  a  risk  to  take  an  alien  child 
or  introduce  strange  blood  into  the  family  which 
may  produce  ingratitude  or  disobedience  ?  One 
may  meet  the  same  faults  in  their  own  children 
who  develop  strange  traits  of  character  from 
long-forgotten  ancestors,  or  wring  a  parent's 
heart  with  unkindness,  indifference  or  neglect. 
I  would  say,  take  the  risk,  leaving  the  issues  to 
God,  and  do  your  duty  faithfully  for  some  other 
mother's  darling,  as  faithfully  and  even  more  so 
than  if  your  own,  and  your  later  years  will  be 
brightened  and  blessed  by  grateful  affection  and 
devoted  filial  care." 

And  if  this  were  done  the  problems  of  the 
poor  and  the  degeneracy  of  the  race  would  be 
far  on  toward  solution. 

Then  let  us  be  brave  women  and  true,  with 
no  taint  of  unfairness  or  dishonor  in  our 
methods  or  ambitions,  but  the  resolve  that  we 
who  have  been  privileged  to  be  alive  to-day, 
and  privileged  to  march  with  the  great 
army  of  those  who  serve,  will  strive  to  share 
what  we  possess,  whether  of  wealth,  intellect 
or  affection,  with  those  who  are  our  sisters  in 
God's  family. 

Let  us  be  charitable,  believing  in  the  sister- 
[204] 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

hood  of  women.  Thoughts  are  things  accord- 
ing to  the  New  Thought,  and  the  law  of  attrac- 
tion will  bring  just  what  we  desire,  whether 
we  think  charitable,  loving  thoughts  or  the 
reverse. 

Let  us  insist  on  doing  our  share  of  work, 
and  only  our  share.  When  we  do  less  we 
are  shirking  our  duty;  when  we  do  more 
we  are  letting  somebody  else  shirk.  Let  us 
adopt  the  "I  can  and  I  will"  motto;  but 
let  us  use  it  with  discretion  and  "will"  only  what 
is  right. 

Let  us  keep  a  steel-rod  vertebra  instead  of  an 
india-rubber  one  in  our  back-bone,  especially 
when  we  have  disagreeable  things  to  do.  For 
back-bone  is  what  too  many  women — and  men, 
too — lack. 

Let  us  believe  there  is  much  more  of  good  than 
of  evil  in  every  human  being;  and  let  us  help 
every  one  with  whom  we  come  in  contact  to  bring 
forth  the  good. 

Let  us  remember  that  Evil  is  but  Ignorance, 
and  that  to  "know  all  is  to  forgive  all";  and  let 
us  think  of  this  every  time  we  are  inclined  to 
condemn  another  woman. 

I  came  across  a  little  poem  in  a  newspaper 
[205] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

one  day,  unsigned  and  uncredited.     I  am  going 
to  adapt  it  for  every-day  use : 

"If  I  should  see  a  sister  languishing  in  distress, 

And  I  should  turn  and  leave  her  comfortless, 

When  I  might  be  a  messenger  of  hope  and  hap- 
piness; 

If  I  might  share  a  sister's  load  along  the  dusty 
way 

And  I  should  turn  and  walk  the  other  way; 

If  I  could  sing  a  little  song  to  cheer  a  fainting 
heart 

And  I  should  sit  and  seal  my  lips  apart — 

"How  could  I  kneel  at  eventide  to  pray 
For  light  along  my  own  heart-weary  way? 
How  could  I  hope  to  have  my  time  of  grief 

relieved 

If  I  kept  silent  when  my  sister  grieved? 
How  could  I  ask  for  what  I  wanted  most 
If  all  these  opportunities  were  lost? 

"So,  Lord,  help  me  to  know 
That  day  is  lost  wherein  I  fail  to  lend 
A  helping  hand  to  some  good  friend, 
Or  bring  a  bit  of  sunshine  to  some  suffering 

heart 
That  walks  apart." 

[206] 


ON   THE   OUTLOOK 

There  is  no  "new  woman."  We  are  all  iden- 
tically the  same  as  Eve  and  Sarah  and  Ruth  and 
- — I  say  it  with  all  reverence — Mary,  the  car- 
penter's mother.  We  have  the  same  natures,  the 
same  intuitions,  the  same  love  of  family  and 
home,  the  same  desire  to  be  of  use  to  others  that 
women  have  always  had ;  only  in  these  wonderful 
modern  times  we  have  kept  pace  with  the  age, 
and  are  developing,  both  as  individuals  and  as 
a  whole.  And  now  that  we  have  stepped  forth 
and  won  places  as  physicians  and  lawyers  and 
ministers,  now  that  we  are  widening  the  ranks  of 
every  profession  as  we  go  forth  on  the  road  to 
higher  achievement,  it  behooves  every  woman- 
soul  of  us  to  ask  ourselves — What  have  /  to  do 
about  it?  Am  I  doing  my  duty  to  the  rest  of 
mankind  ?  Am  I  bearing  my  share  of  the  burden 
of  the  world?  Or,  if  this  last  is  denied  me,  am 
I  possessing  my  soul  in  patience  and  living  up 
to  the  splendid  present?  Am  I  sweet  and 
gentle  and  strong  and  helpful?  Am  I  criti- 
cal of  no  one  but  myself?  Am  I  loving  to- 
wards my  family?  my  neighbor?  my  friend? 
my  enemy?  Am  I  helping  the  cause  of  the 
woman  of  to-morrow  by  working  out  my 
own  life  problem  with  the  child-heart  and 
[207] 


THE   WOMAN  OF  TO-MORROW 

the    Christ-love    to   sweeten    existence    for   all 
around  me? 

"Life  is  too  short  to  waste 
In  critic  peep  or  cynic  bark, 

Quarrel  or  reprimand; 
'Twill  soon  be  dark. 

Let  us  up  and  mind  our  aim, 
And  God  speed  the  mark!" 


THE  END 


[208] 


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